Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Fates through Sky
by Starry's Light
Summary: Most indubitably, Llana felt that life finally was beginning to pat her on the head. That is, until her dearly not-dead "Stella" shows again in her dreams alongside nightmares thwarting of revenge from the are-dead. Unable to bear the loss of another important entity, Llana knows she'll have to stop the ensuing torture- but at the cost of what will she stand up for... to only lose?
1. We Return

_O: The Beginning_

_Humming softly in their dimly-lit home, their glossy, waterlogged appearances only adding to the gleam on their wet bodies, the pokemon smiled and chatted loftily as they moved about the room, cleaning the airy-yet-snug chamber they used as a restaurant together. The first, a large, glossy bird bloomed in the color of white feathers combed about her, sang freely through her pale blue bill as a deeper blue for her webbed toes stamped accordingly to the ground. Her partner, the wet, floppy one roaming behind, trounced aquamarine toes flapping and squishing as he stepped to a less-elegant tune in his head. They sang to their hearts' content to completely differentiating songs, but that did not matter: they were connected in the chords of their love for one another, deep inside each entity._

"_MMmmmmmmMary, did you hear?" called the other one through his floppy steps._

"_Mm? Ah, yes, I did. Llana seems to be recovering well after all that happened, what with the ice castle in the sky or whatnot." She paused in her music, the swanna did, pondering over the pale-scaled grass reptile, scrawny but warmhearted anyway. "You know... how those bitter what-was-it attacked the sweet what-was-it and... her dear Elijah died. And her odd little celestial Stella..."_

_They stayed silent for an entire moment in their time spent with one another: Elijah was the sacred word of a long-dead emolga, the bright, cheeky, flightful mammal now long-dead with cold bones. "May he rest in peace on the Glacial Palace's floor."_

"_Yes," whispered the floppy one, "yes... mm... indeed. Mmmmmay her dear friend Zoey help her recover." Cheerful banter ensued at that name: Zoey, the peppy little water mammal herself, the color of the sky on a great, cloudy morning. Quite a naïve oshawott, she was. "And may the others recover as well."_

"_Oh, Quagsire," cooed the swanna toward he—who was, in fact, a quagsire. "I'm sure they're doing fine now. It hasn't been too long, but they seem to smile more now. Stella, too... I feel—as I'm sure you do—that she'll show up sometime. But... er... Do remind me... what was Llana again?"_

_In voice of the steadily-healing snivy, their persiflage again dipped so softly. "She's the Sweethot, course. Special celestial being surrounded by others, attracted to her just by her identiy. And... mmm... Sweethot—that's that word they use nowadays to call that mmmmmmutation of happiness, and how... hummmane it became, eh?_

"_Course, Bittercold's their opposite, hmm. Lady MMmmmMunaah—that dead, pink mmmmunna we all forgot—was Llana's antonymmm. She was well hated and a poor desperate little child. Now she's dead. Llana's left. The mmmmmmutation of rejoice seems to've beaten the mmmmmmutation of fear, hate, all that."  
_

"_Let us hope it stays that way, dear."_

_He paused—not for the deceased munna, but for Llana. "That's all she can do—she's the Hope indeed."_

"_Indubitably," reminded Mary, though quite softly._

_They then left the information, like a batch of stale cookies, sitting out, tabled, ready for a response only to go without one. They each recalled with vivid passion—a passion that keeps one up at night, terrified to fall asleep—what the great palace of ice in the sky had looked like, sitting atop the clouds and corrupting further with ice, and with icy cold, chilling-to-the-marrow hate, and pain, and suffering. Now that the castle had fallen, they could merely wish to never see its frigid, frozen tips again. The blood that spilled from the edges of cold, hard, merciless fate._

_May it never return to the tiny island of Truught again._

Chapter 1: We Return

Auburn eyes wide open, head swiveling about and inadvertently smacking just the slightest against the yellow leaflets ringing my shoulders, hand squeezed thoroughly by the wet, white one tied within it, we pant like a team, dashing along the lines of the well-worn path in a further-out Mystery Dungeon, ready to take on the challenges before us. Whatever they may be. My head flickers to the right again, catching glimpse stride-by-stride with the oshawott beside me, her eyes and smile bright: weightless and doubtless. Zoey appears just as happy as I feel that we've gotten this far.

Up ahead, the large, grassy green legend pulls to one of her gentle stops. The flecks of loose grass beneath her pale toes shine through, nigh matching to her furry composure—surreal, almost appearing like a living plant. "Well, I think we're about to get up this hill soon," she states, wise tone rising and falling onto each of our shoulders with each and every word. "And... we'll find out what's on the bottom. Zoey, what was this Mystery Dungeon called again?"

Her watery gaze brightens further. "Oh, yeah, Virizion! I think it's like... uh... wait..." The light dies, flickers again. Her seawater accent sticks out further like the sore toe it can be. "Ah... I just had it! Sorry!" Her face blisters out in bright red.

"It's fine, Zo—"

"AHA! I remembered! We're in Honeydew Basins! I told you I just had it!" Beneath fronds of sopping wet, tropically blue shoulder fur, Zoey's back straightens: pride curls her cheeks into a bigger, brighter grin.

"Ah, okay. Thank you for that. I'm happy you recalled." Purple eyes brightening, Virizion's own grin strengthens as well and she and Zoey share that small moment before the legend shakes herself and turns ahead, amid the flower fields and glowing sunrise at the tip of the mountainous hillock. Upon reaching such depths, we turn our heads to the circle in the sky, luminous through even the gentle-hued clouds varying from colors of soft pinks and blues.

Within a squeak of her own, our final member tromps up the grassy pathways and lands with a squeak in a cluster of petals that flow into her silvery braids. "A-ah..." mumbles the bagon. Her head follows ours, amber orbs catching drift of the sun and its rise once again. "It's funny... how pretty these sorts of places can be, especially with all the death watch and... stuff..." Jen's soft, high-pitched cry draws me away from the oshawott and virizion, down into her view. We sit in the petals like this, a silence soft like the warmth in our shared hearts wrapping about.

Guiltily, Jen's eyes hastily clamber up to mine. "Llana... does it still hurt?"

She doesn't have to tell me; I know who she speaks of. A dull ache pinches my chest up tighter, but just to a slight edge. I'm recovering from it, from the events that sent his life down the drain. "It does, but... it's a better ache. It's one that reminds me of him... and it doesn't hurt all that much." That doesn't mean I'm still afraid to sleep at night, to close my eyes when I know that a nocturnal creature like an emolga would watch over me—over us—best late in the evening; or just catching a glimpse of his pained best friend, of what he's left behind.

"I'm sure Elijah's watching over you—wherever he is now. I'm sure of it..!"

My lighter, royal tone washes over again. "I think so too." And a thought touches me. "Jen, your voice is a lot... prettier, now that the stutter doesn't break it off."

Even beneath piles upon piles of pastel-colored petals, I can sight the cyan dragonet's smile beneath her large, ovular snout. Truly, though, she has changed after those events as well. I do recall what happened in the... the ice chambers, the cold wind settling down deep in my blood, almost a puppeteer to my motions and stringing me along in cold silence... I freely loathe that castle; the thought snaps within me and I turn back to concerned amber orbs containing the light of the sunrise. "Thanks, Llana. May we all stop breaking off like it."

"Yes..." And it's true; the words cling coldly, softly, like bells in my chest as I raise a pale green scaled hand and pluck Jen's out from the sea of flowers, taking her up along with our other friends to meet the ends of the hill within, and whatever could encompass the bottom. Her silvery braids, tossed over one shoulder, quiver through what must be excitement as we set out again.

Amber orbs meet blue. "Zoey, what was the Mystery Dungeon called again?"

"Honeydew Basins! Jeez, Jen, get it right!" An affectionate wink turns from any accidental harm caused by her words; Zoey's face widens into a great, white grin, teeth showing themselves off excessively. "So... anyone else wondering when we'll start beating up baddies senseless? Er, I guess not you Llana since you're all Sweethot or whatever but—gah! You guys know what I mean." A flurry of awkwardly-paced nods reassure the oshawott of this. "Yeah, yeah, you guys know what I mean." Zoey adds to the bobbling cacophony of heads. "So who wants to go first down the hill?"

Virizion blinks slowly. "I feel it would be safer if we all went together, especially when Jen came so far behind prior. Would you not agree?"

"Yeah, but I kinda liked the idea where we all went down one-by-one..."

"Zoey, we need to act by what's safer: not what you think sounds the most fun." Her renewed grin softens the blow, though.

"Aw, okay. I'll go nicely."

Our feet dip and plod endlessly through the pastel-colored petals, sending us further through the tip of the hillock like walking through the hairs of a head until we cross the edges of such elevations and begin the painfully obvious steep trek down again. The flowers slip from view until only the patches of dirt and sea-like expanse of grass enters our fields of vision. Through a rising sun, the Mystery Dungeon's dip below cannot be easily interpreted: shadows stretch too far and thick to produce a clear enough envisioning. Notions beating firmly in my heart feel much safer than I predicted; perchance this will lead to a more careful sort of place, a bubble of peace amid the hapless destruction in Mystery Dungeons through all their dangerous glory.

There is a reason, I vaguely recall, that we live on a rather large island donning the name of Truught; or the fact that it goes by "trouble isle" as well. Enough of such reason defines why we may feel wary here. But if creatures like us can meet creatures like Jen—so docile and, as memory serves, in such a monster-filled Dungeon itself—there can be peace. And in the end, sometimes those simple statements prove the only sort of hope: there can be peace.

Oddly, the notion rings thoughts, colorful thoughts, of the pokemon currently left behind in some way or another, spending their time in Paradise. Of Cheeka and Ember, who surely would feel pride in my thoughts of this peace; of Burr the brown-furred, cheeky-eyed timburr and his mienfoo girlfriend, the mostly-healthy magenta- and yellow-furred biped always flocking toward him; of Tim and his dark eyes, that of course recall empty throbs in chords of Elijah and his own black orbs; of Bay as well, the flighted reptile himself and his sadistic loss of his best friend. Emotions and thoughts, attached carelessly to one another, spiral about and flock as they please until the rustle of footsteps signals that Zoey has noticed my daze and grew tired of wait, flinging herself into the hillock once again.

With nothing else to do, I give chase, easily catching placement within the fronds of our team to an ensemble of moves.

Lying at the crook of the hillock shines none much more in the dreary half-light than a stream. It talks as it goes, a babbling run of water amongst the hills that dashes along as it pleases, perhaps in a game of tag with some other celestial water source refusing to show itself in the morning darkness. Later on, further out in our little crook, the stream loses tendrils of its siblings, splitting on its own in differing directions, causing a web of waters, crisscrossing all throughout the grassy nadir and dying out as it reaches upward again into the reaches of other hillocks we'd caught sight of prior. And eventually, the waters and their lined currents toil out of existence, their lines shrinking the further my eyes can go.

"Odd. I expected at least a single pokemon here."

Zoey blinks slowly, as if unable to take in our surroundings. "Yeah, Virizion. It's kinda weird. But... it looks like it's pretty too."

"I wonder where the pokemon go when they aren't attacking us," mumbles Jen beside me, half into her cyan fingers.

In response, I give her a light nudge in the shoulder and turn my pointed head toward the oshawott. But it is... an odd notion. "I think you're all a little right."

"But mine was a question."

I turn back to the bagon. "It was a good question."

"It was?"

"It was," echoes Virizion. "A question we just don't hold an answer yet to. But... I do like this turn of scenery. I'm sure we all do. Quite a beautiful sight, it is." We each nod toward her own addition. "We should come back here sometime. Maybe bring other members. Just enjoy the scenery."

"We should..."

"We should..."

"Aw, yeah! Let's totally do that!" Heads turn back to the water-dripping mammal. "That plan sounds great! Yay!"

Virizion blinks, squeaks a muffled giggle. "I'm happy to know you like that idea, Zoey." Her eyes glow with a luminous, churning sensation; soft laughter colors from hillock horizon to hillock horizon. It's nice, this gentle feeling holding us all in our team and ensnaring us with multiple, metaphorical bindings, ensuring our togetherness. Such a warm, bubbly thought: how we stick like this. My eyes glaze over in this pool of kind emotions. I know that this can't possibly last forever, and I should take in what I can. When I can. From my best friend and my team: and sometimes I feel like those words ensconce much more than they regularly do.

Keeping Honeydew Basins in mind, our small group turns back round and we begin our trek back up the trail we'd just left off of, up toward the call of the flower hillock and the gentle slopes and streams and petals that lay on ahead.

"Oh, but when we come here next time, we'd better have some Mystery Dungeon spawn pokemon things to fight because that was like boring." Zoey's shoulder thumps into mine as we walk.

"Yes, Zoey." I smile slowly back at her, and an eradicating grin bounces along her cheeks, bubbly and big.

"Yes indeed~!"

_Stella_

The majestic, white-furred creature stepped slowly and shakily down the glimmering pathway. Her purple eyes continued darting nervously throughout the quiet, serene landscape, cracking the royal air carried about her. Fear so plainly painted her face: not even the white fur and deep, luminescent, purple orbs could hide her frozen-up worries building up on the inside. With each step, her fluffy paws released an audible residue—a deep, puffy _fump, fump _that went along with her motions and layers of white fur, like banks of snow poured down onto the quadrupedal.

"A-ah... I hate this so much," she grumbled, the royal tone still holding true, though thinner and weaker. Another stiff, stilted movement with her paw and it appeared she was ready to crack into an innumerable amount of little Stella giblets. "I hate this. I hate this." She chanted the words under her breath like a spell, a mad fizz sizzling in her pupils. "Hate... hate... A-hh..." She blinked slowly, shook out fluffy white curls. "Where are th-"

A louder, wider-pawed _fump, fump _broke through the odd, weak mumble of words Stella had begun. Still, the fuzziness in her orbs flickered as she turned, facing a furry creature not much differing of her own form: the largest difference was his bright red streaks of hairs instead of the unbreakable whites, other differences quite minor.

"You took longer than I predicted, Father."

"Why, Stella, you've grown." His voice held strong and pure, the royal accent so thick and full Stella obviously received her own version of the tone from him: her father indeed. "Quite a bit, I see.

"We've missed you so."

Her fizzy orbs crackled. "That cannot be true. Not after..." Stella didn't finish, just slowly shook out the starry-white furs about her narrow head and snout and stared her father down once more.

His own eyes blinked—surprised, could he be? "Aye, it can. And it is. Just because you've committed a deed entities find disastrous does mean naught when compared to entities like us. And the daughter of the chieftain is destined to be missed. There's not a soul here who knows not of your name."

"There—n-no, you're right," she replied, mumbling half into her fur as her head lowered in a sign of obeisance—or shame, possibly. "There's not a soul, I suppose."

"You suppose..? Well, as your father and ruler, however lax that latter niche may stand with our kind, I assure you without such a fragile word that they do. Stella, they know you."

Gaze unmoving, cheeks rounding to a sight pink, she mumbled a few inaudible words. Her father chortled in response: a great, bellowing sound filling the yellow-sparkling hallow with voice. "Yes, your friends missed you as well." Another mumble; another laugh. "Yes, he did as well—yes, I'm sure. "Quite"—the gently rounded red eyes flashed—"indubitably, if I may."

Finally, a round of voice echoed in his daughter's tone. "You may."

"I thought, I suppose, 'twas cute how your little friends down there caused that."

"Y-yes, Father..."

He smiled for the umpteenth time, but the toothy show seemed to lose a flow of vim. "Yes, dear. But I'm afraid we do not have much time until... your friend realizes something."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"That's because it... is. Stella, the Bittercold you thought you'd ridden that poor nation of was the wrong soul this entire time. Who you took out was just a desperate little puppet hung by strings for that... darker one to use. I'm afraid your little friends could be in... a sort of danger."

**Me: And of course it's impossible to start the second Llana story without Stella making a show.**

**Stella: Why thank ya.**

**Me: Ignoring that snide little... well, here we go. The first chapter of the story. I've officially decided that here on out, any sequel I made NEEDS a prologue to cover everything. Like serious need. So I trust that helps new readers comprehend what's going on a little more. So, uh, thank you!**


	2. Deep Breaths in Used Homes

Chapter 2: Deep Breaths in Used Homes

Overall, a glowing, sunny, sort of flowery scent raids the breeze as it billows past us, accompanied by the hefty _crunch, crunch _of our group's pairs of feet on gravel and assorted grasses. Even though Zoey's mumbling suggests we should have stayed longer in the Honeydew Basins and that we should have at least swum and that we should have noticed that we all stunk to the rinds of hard, sweet sugar and that we should have done something—I at least feel the naïve oshawott's rants are halfhearted and mostly used to hold up fragile sets of dialogue back and forth. As if fizzy and filled with excitement, bits of conversation whiz by with the extent of a firecracker rattling in my ears.

I do offer my own bits: I'm my own builder of these explosions. These pokemon... where would I be, had Zoey never met me? Perchance the purple biped with her—Acorn: that aipom—had not died, and neither of them found me... perchance we never met. Or would we? Would I take a run-in with Espa and Umbre as their pants rung with the toll of their lives—as the once-living minions of _her _and the black-colored one as well and... everyone ran after them—perhaps we were destined to meet, our souls written in the same starlit ink and sealed together.

Prongs in my chest reassure me that Ember and Cheeka would find my Sweethot soul one way or another. A single glance into their pink, all-seeing orbs would provide this. They did know me, through Stella or not, and did hold intentions to find me as well. Because I am who I am, and apparently this somehow holds importance to the psychic ones of red and blue. To them, and to Stella, at the least, this means a great ordeal, how Paradise burst into start because pokemon and other assorted entities flocked to me: Burr, Tim, Quagsire: every last one of them.

...perchance.

And again, the thoughts and notions and scents and tangs and pains and sights, tastes and touches, the feelings swirl within me and force charge; the ensemble of faces, of memories, surges through again and plunges me in through the strength of a great warrior, a tidal wave of emotions flogging the single snivy on the surf. Back... prior to meeting Zoey, to meeting anyone, for the days when I spent repeatedly following my Gerald and my Stella, those memories surface as well like the foam of the waters, white and obvious, palpable and easy to point out. Because they honestly had been different than these new ones. They had. Not truly a ne plus ultra, a crème of the crop, but there indeed.

Thoughts strife with surface again as I nearly stumble into the wall of seawater-embedded fur lying to my front. Through a splutter, I mumble, "Zoey..."

"Hey, Llana, I'm walkin' here!" The tone softens. "Guess you stumbled again. Heh..." I... do that now, when I'm focused on the then. The past; the worst part is recalling that the past does not coexist with the present, or the future, and so the then is not the now, and I will never reach then again except in memories, which can take my mind and force me to nearly stumble into the jolly mammal like so.

Finally, the well-trodden path leads out into the grassy fronds of Paradise in its purest form: spread out on the warm blanket of greenery situates a place of great, joyous energy being used to create all sorts of happiness. To put it in simpler, less-airy terms: our home. The word hits me softly again: home.

A place for us, all of us. And feeling the aureole of our creatures rung around the entity of Paradise, of _home, _pounds on deep, meaningful chords in my heart. "This is home, Zoey."

She giggles again: softer, kinder. "Yes it is, Llana. This is home."

Virizion and Jen already ahead, the smaller and larger shadows of our friends dispersing from our sides as Zoey's wet, white fingers scrawl across my back and interlace upon my other side, around my torso snugly, a wet squeeze. "I feel like nothing can stop me since, you know... Elijah's probably looking down on me in shame, but he can't like attack me from stealing you. If that made any sense."

"It made enough sense, Zoey."

"Good, good. For a moment there I totally had no idea if my words were connecting. Like at all." The comfort-by-time scent of her wet, nigh salty fur assures me that Elijah most indubitably is looking down on her, though maybe in a happier tone, with knowledge that I'm healing. But still, there are boundaries that not even this lonely little oshawott can scramble over, boundaries that cannot possibly release the sunny, white cheeks that brightened into his trademark cheeky grin, or how his large, dark orbs always glinted with a sort of mischievous tone. Not that the fences pluck me apart, but they allow me to remember, I believe. Not that I could forget.

Smiling slowly, softly, my head turns toward Zoey and her sparkling, sapphire orbs. "So you say you want to kiss me?"

"Aw, gosh no! No no no no no no no no! Llana, that's like _really really gross! You're grossssssss!" _Giggling, a bundle of watery fingers playfully rubs at my cheek. "What do you think about in that creepy snivy brain of yours?"

"Not kissing you—that's for sure."

"You'd better not, or I'll have to go in there and give some brain cells a thorough scrubbing!" Oddly, the thought of a naïve little water mammal scrambling around my internal body parts with a bit of cloth and her own water source to attempt and scrape away dirtied vessels evokes a sharp cry of a laugh. Out of the corner of my eye, a smirk squiggles across her face like she'd drawn it herself: bright and airy and pink. "Dang, Llana, for the Sweethot you sure got a blackened brain!"

"Have I not joked before?"

"Heck, it used to be a rare miracle blessing of some legendary to hear you talk in the first place! Llana, like, joking? C'mon, that's gotta be delusional." Her other paw sidles up to my head and pokes the scaled tip. Zoey holsters a smile in her teeth, a bright one, and tugs at me slightly. "Home."

And we've gone back to where we started from. "Home indeed."

She smiles, offers a bark of laughter in return, and tugs again. Our feet finally hold out and step to an encore, our own encore into the continuous crunch of dewy grass underneath one's toes as one and their partner stink of honey and feel just as warm and sweet on the inside as the sugary taste coating the out. Zoey, whose feet still hold a much larger, rounder, and altogether greater in each and every size take out much larger clumps of grass as the heel gradually moves further ahead of me until she releases herself from my side and scampers off into the comforting confines of Paradise.

Slower and shorter, I stay at a leisure pace as my mind rumbles in my head with a storm of thoughts. Perchance... I could spend time searching out Espa and Umbre, ask them how their plans were coming. If we really do wish to remake those entercards for the Glacial Castle... the one in the sky... and we do wish to change it, to make it brighter, happier, much like another Paradise and clear out the death pertained to the area that surely still sits there today...

Like Elijah's... corpse...

It's only a mini sort of project, a small idea summoned by Bay or Jen or someone else, but it's a plan that the eevee-evolved creatures do want to partake in. Many a time, I've noticed how much lighter the atmosphere about us feels now that we know the Bittercold has rotted away. And... this can only hinder the hated materials further. That sounds to something an entity like I should help with, especially when the darkened similarity of me—Lady Munaah, through and through—has long since lost her life and thus bested mine over her own sort of madness.

I would enjoy it. Elijah... he does deserve a... a proper burial... As much as I hate the tone in my head, cold and metallic and throbbing, aching, it's a truth. Elijah would like that. Elijah... would like that. Indeed. Indubitably.

A sudden weight fills my lungs. With a dart, my head snaps back up and I turn to stare to nothing but empty, harmless air—leading into the confines of the grassy and joyous Paradise, yes, but empty still. Soft voices carry along the route of the wind and hang about snugly, again assuring me: it was nothing. Just another foreboding guess that something could be out there; nothing is out there. Out... of our visions, our capabilities—anything. Nothing lies in wait.

The sinking throb in my chest weights further, rips at my heart. "Who... is there?"

No one answers. No one should. Still, the leaflets wrapped about my yellowed shoulders shake as I move on to a brisker pace. After what happened there... and the deaths that consumed and fell like boulders tearing into their paths, into us... someone is allowed to feel an extra dose of fear when they lose like that. I feel that they are for as long as they can stand it; just another bite to swallow with the berries we eat.

Calling out to me—the pain only worsens. My eyesight shifts back, tone breaks into a fit of a wheeze, eyes squeeze tight, heart throbbing between gritted teeth. Get off of my back already; whoever it could be, you died. You died you died you died you died you died.

Died.

You can't be here.

You can't b_e here!—_

_THUMP—smack. _"Llana."

Head swimming, I stare up at the black gaze with a heart's leap until it falls back down my throat with a lurch. I sorely force my toes back to their tips and shove myself back up to stare at the eyes myself, mumbling a "Tim."

"You don't look well."

Was that you... Tim? The creature in the shadows that I didn't see and couldn't catch otherwise? Were you waiting for me, waiting to strike? Each thought proves more ridiculous than the last, but I can't hep to continue and gape up at the tall, smoke-furred biped that I unceremoniously bumped into. I recall what forced the uneasy feelings into me from him prior and would not like to go near whatever... that was... but... The black orbs swerve in front of me as a hand, fluffy and smoky like the clouds, hits on a shoulder and forces me to stop teetering.

"Be careful."

"I'm fine."

"You're not." I bite my lip in response, stare up at him fiercer. I can't possibly tell Tim that I think he's been lurking in unseen shadows—he's harmless; he's on our side—but perchance my wobbly, auburn orbs know how to convey a message. "You need to lie down. Find some food. Some rest."

The hand clenching my arm pricks warmer, almost a sweltering hot. "I'm fine." In a flustered attempt, I tug myself back and nearly knock my scrawny self over once more. "I'm fine, Tim, I'm fine."

"You've nearly fallen again, Llana; let me help y—"

"No!" My voice peters off. "No... no no no... I'm okay... I'm okay..." It doesn't matter how much kinder the timburr pretends to be, whether he's sincere or not. I don't want to be so close to such a... foreboding creature...

Memories, brightly lit with blood in my eyes, recall of the time he'd flashed into a purely, psychologically lost beast that ripped and shredded at Bay and Gurdurr with long, wicked claws pertained to too much blood to possibly be from just those near him alone. And we never had the chance to see his eyes... if they also shone the bloody, uncontrolled red as all else did. It's always a possibility Tim knew what he did and continued anyways with an odd decisive snap.

Admittedly, it's strange to have a creature like me—though there only is one Sweethot, even as it is—act so... hostile against an innocent entity like... Tim. But I somehow wriggle my shoulder loose from the sharp, dizzying hold and backpedal away from the timburr, not even glancing back a single time as I scuttle off. Thankfully, I don't directly bump into another soul as I go on, and eventually the throbbing source in my skull loses its power. Ditching my faster pace, I slow to a stroll and search again for the pelts of lavender and midnight that should provide me at least temporary resolve of revoked fears.

My single stop is to turn aside and wave lonesomely at the other timburr—with mild, chocolatey fur that doesn't represent dark and dreary fumes—as he crosses my side: Burr, unlike his friend, rocks kinder emotions in my heart. Burr is good. Burr... he, I know, is someone I can trust. The majority of my friends I do trust, but Tim...

Tim is Tim; he is none else but himself. Nothing can possibly change that. The Bittercold has melted and peace has risen amongst us... no matter what Cheeka and Ember had thought and do think: the psychic ones may have been... wrong.

Finally I manage to halt for a stop and watch over a certain duo of quadrupedal pokemon as they walk slowly and peacefully about ahead. Before calling out to them, one of their tones murmurs a name through the silence, the other repeating another. Whatever muddled words hide in their tones, I miss, and call out softly, "Espa... Umbre... is that—"

Purple fur spike around the first's neck. "Llana, you sound out of breath! Don't kill yourself over the ordeal!" Her bejeweled head turns round to face me. Our eyes link. "As an intellectual, I know well enough when one has overused their stamina. But... you seem to have calmed some."

"Dear, your shouting at her will produce a heart attack!"

More lilac clumps spike in the most erratic fashion. "K-kinks! Stop that! You know that couldn't happen!"

"You're still yelling."

"I am not yelli—Oh, I suppose I am. Sorry, Llana." As her head leans into a bow of sorts, the duo sinks to the ground. "Come join us, will you?" So I do, slowly trotting past their feline bodies on the soft, not-so-spiked-and-wet grasses leading up to them, turning and sitting so that our faces meet.

Umbre blinks first; his deep scarlet orbs look misty and peculiar on me. "Why hello again, Llana," says he in his slow, whimsical tone.

"Hello; if you don't mind me asking, who is Kinks?" Again, my mind recollects the events of Espa's and Umbre's bantering and the slip of that word. Kinks. Could it address someone they know?

Umbre's midnight cheeks lighten to a near rosy tint. "Oh, that's just my old name. You know, before I evolved." Intended as a vengeful look, the umbreon forms a smug grin toward his mate. "And Espa was Luna! Funny how that turned out, isn't it?"

"L-Luna?" Struggling, my brain finds itself unable to imagine the sleek, violet espeon as anything else but the sleek, violet espeon she is.

He chortles in response. "Yes; her parents were set on seeing their little Luna an umbreon! I swear, they wanted to kill someone when they eventually learned about their daughter being an espeon—and not only that, but changing her name to suit her needs as well!"

"You did that too, Umbre," mumbles the mentioned Espa, her whiskers hung parallel to the grassy plain below. "Everyone thought you wouldn't evolve to much but, if anything, maybe a scant little sylveon—you know, all the ribbons and such—and look at their faces when you're you. Hah..."

"Personally, I like Umbre more than Kinks."

"Yes, and I like Espa more than Luna. I wasn't set out to be the greatest sort of umbreon, anyways. I think you turned out better than I would have been."

"Espa, are you trying to make me blush on purpose now?" It goes on like this, one and the other smiling and giggling in little bursts as they talk about the past in a vague wave of speak, like they're filtering out the small, important bits and purposely holding out the larger but mainly unimportant topics: just a main idea, with the hidden aspects missing. But... how odd to think of them, to know now that their purposely stereotypical names reflect nothing on their past selves and past lives, of what propelled them to becoming Espa, to becoming Umbre, to choose this and take it in as one's own. One day I would hope to be spared the true details, the real events coursing such change to happen to the eeveeloutions, but for now alone the fact that they really did have past characters to call themselves... How odd indeed.

Eventually, I miraculously recall what I wanted to banter with the mates and somehow find a way to bring them back into the original conversation. "I wanted to ask you about... what you think could occur when we go back... there."

Each of Espa and Umbre offer warm, wide smiles: the only opposition being the lilac or midnight backdrop. The umbreon breaks his spell first: "Well, we had... you know, the burial planned. And we'd decided to figure how to keep a continuous gate, sort of, to hold our Paradise and the work-in-process Paradise together. And we'll need a mite bit of supplies in case something happens. Because it's impossible to be too careful. Well... I guess it is, but that matter has nothing to do with this one."

"Agreed," I murmur.

"Indubitably, dear," tags on Espa.

He nods in a more solemn posture to such. "Yes. Yes indeed. Indubitably. We'll want those. So that's pretty much our start. But... you want to know... what could happen there? A-ah! I see!" His misty eyes brighten: small rings of scarlet shimmering at the thoughts of what could intercept our missions. "Well, there's always possibilities that... you know, stuff like what happened to our Paradise will show up. Like... perchance we'll meet more legends, sent from Arceus or Stella or whoever. Perchance we'll see some sort of Sweethot place like that Bittercold palace—which is dead. It's dead. I dearly cross my paws we don't have another of those outbreaks again. I'd rather not go back to those... things. And we'll surely meet new sorts of pokemon.

"But this is our home, and this is where we belong. Their own Paradise can be linked all it wants, but we belong here, and they'll understand us whence they belong there." We each nod at this, and it reminds me of Zoey herself, how we'd tagged each other with that word: home. And this... this truly is where I belong. Here, alongside the dear creatures that I've met and will never let go of—no more than I will of Elijah.

Awkwardly, I mumble, "No one like Mary, I'm guessing?"

"Well, sometimes I like to compare myself to Mary." Espa blinks, lets out a breath. "Ehh, hehhh, kidding. She's a bit hard of a soul to replace, though I presume all souls are. They'll meet us for sure, but I don't know if she or Quagsire or Gurdurr, even, will want to really help start out the new Paradise. They seem much more contented here as it is. Honestly, Quagsire seems to go out on his strolls much... less, lately."

A sudden, rattling wind streams out in a wild, blusterous motion against us, knocking against nearby trees and causing a shush, a silence only broken by the _creeeeaaaaaakk, creeeeeeeaaaakkk_ of branches: old and young alike.

"Maybe he's getting old," mumbles Espa to her own question. I nearly lose her brave and yet matter-of-fact tone to the bluster.

Umbre, scarlet orbs tittering, shakes himself. "No... I mean he's old, and I feel like he was one of those old warrior hero guys that no one remembers since we're all young and stupid—"

"Umbre!"

"—but I also don't know. None of us really do. Just a guess from the top of my all-too-creative mind, though I think it's maybe in the right direction."

Unsure of how to respond to such a thought—of Quagsire being a great hero of older times, ruing scatterbrained foes with an iron—though flabby—fist—I merely offer a shrug. With a cold, dreary hand, the air nearly plucks me out of the earth until I land with a hard _THUMP _on my rump. It seems to whistle and cackle down on us.

"Anyone digressing if we continue our conversation somewhere without the big, scary, black clouds and wind?"

Espa and I oblige to Umbre's statement, hustling beside and near him as we each force a sharp sprint into our step, running away with the wind and staring hopefully toward the large, wooden home that protrudes toward us through landscape as we hope: don't rain yet; don't rain yet; don't rain yet.

While we move away, it almost seems that freestyle currents whiz past my ear and whisper words that don't fit together but send a shiver down my spine nonetheless.

**Funny how the first chapter was all happy like FRIENDS and then this one is like FRIENDS but it's also like RAWR WIND.**

**Tim: Winds don't rawr.**

**Me: Hush up, Tim. Llana doesn't think you're all that great.**

**Tim: ene; Stop, Starry. Just stop.**

**Me: Haaah. Oi, so to the readers, I've decided I'll make this little author note niche in the corner here, where I can be both stupid, pro-Tim, and speak about my original ideas (because I don't understand them myself) all at the same time~!**

**Tim: Oh, joy. -snorts-**

**Me: Well... the first couple of chapters really aren't much different. Life is going as it's going. We see Llana and we understand that she has buddies and they're not dead and OI, THE BITTERCOLD ISSS DEAD! But of course chapter two has wind. Which is evil.**

**Tim: Starry, you've stopped making sense. Wind doesn't...**

**Me: Yeah, I'm not listening to you.**

**Tim: I figured. That's why I stopped talking. But honestly, readers, wind doesn't rawr and it's not evil. Jeez.**


	3. Stormy Night, Broken Rest

Chapter 3: Stormy Night, Broken Rest

The comfort of our wooden door, enclosing us of Paradise off from the rest of the world, sticks shut with a sharp _squeeeeeaaaaak _and a _BANG _as rain pellets hard and from every direction, taking over the grassy fields and gentle woodland and streams: all that crafts to form our home. A gentle thrumming—though still one only Zoey would mildly wish to spend outside with—of raindrops announces its presence upon us. Thankfully for our group, Gurdurr truly does and did understand the basic to some of the finer details of his art, and thus our central house does not fold over and crash into itself, either killing or surely wetting just short of all inhabitants. My mind refuses to believe how capable my feline companions and I had become of to ensure ourselves not pounded to furry and scaled bits by the cold hand of the storm. Further cracks and bolts of light zipping outside locked-shut windows provide a view for the long, dark journey in the sky ahead.

"Aw, darn, I don't really like thunderstorms..." The sharp cry of a voice forces me to jump. Turning back, I recognize the elongated yellow one, wings stretched about his round head like a protective barrier from the noise. Bay: like no other. His tail twists about aside him, as restless as his deep cyan orbs appear to be, flicking back and forth without a certain angle or hope, just an aimless notion in need of help. "They're too loud for me... heh." Finally, Bay's gaze finds a home on a crack in the wooden floorboards. Such target flicks in a white, bright floor of color at irregular intervals—each time followed by a hefty _booooooooooooom._

Judging by the cooler front of temperature and loud ensemble of rain and thunder, I don't blame the stout little dunsparce for his reaction. They all-too much resemble the crystalline walls of all-encompassing chill... a chill that seeps into your bones, your heart, into the deepest cracks of one's entity and cannot be scraped out. The shrieks and cries of bloody murder on the ice castle's floors, reverberating throughout the cold dorms almost as if without a care, buzz dully in the slits of my ears and easily resemble the hushed chill of raindrops bouncing on the roof of our home. Though I do know this is safer—no one from the squadron making up the Bittercold could hop out of the thunder and lightning, proclaiming their position loud and clear and only bringing us back... but they can't. We also don't pertain to a death risk—or death toll.

Death limits a being's capabilities. Such as it did to... him. And them as well—and they... cannot cooperate to us with what capabilities their deceased selves still hold. For what they've done... what they've caused... It's sad, is all. It's a sad world out there.

He refers to Elijah... and they: they... they're...

A bright flash of pink light punches out the lights in my head for a dumbfounded moment, tossing my senses in a tizzy until the smoky face, cruel and peeling with every enhancement of her smirk, peters out again.

They refers to Lady Munaah and her old friends... though I, with a guilty pang, doubt any of such old friends exist on this world currently. Honestly, I feel bile rise up in my throat and coat my tongue at the thought of _them. _Because they hurt me; because they hurt him—they hurt Elijah and they can't take back the blood that fell. Blinding memories slash across my face like claws, cold and burning, an oxymoron breaking my scaled expression in half.

_BOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMM._

Accompanied just on the tip of a bright white line of lightning, the snatch of dark noise screeches through our home, only a small haven in the midst of burly, beefy, black clouds. Their bulging muscles dance along the smoky lines, as if daring our small crusade to come out and battle. But battle what exactly? Nature? Can one destroy nature? No... one cannot demolish natural selection or any of the sort; my eyes deceive. Slowly, shakily, I turn back from the glass in the walls, revealing our little show, and take one step, and another, and another, away. My footsteps, if even heard, could only represent a child's walk in the wake of a father.

A father...

Eyes flickering toward the ground, the word coldly slides down my throat. Again, I shake it off like the rain, like the Bittercold or the ice palace or Munaah—we are safe; we are safe—because I should have nothing to fear. For what feels like the first time in an endless burning monsoon of sunrises, I forcibly move my thoughts from the sadistic notions and try to close my eyes, sink to the floor, and picture a white-muzzled smirk in my head. Stella. Wherever she's gone, we'll have to find her again. She promised. She promised to show up once more... and she is honestly my only living family. I know Stella couldn't simply slip out of view. Wherever she is... wherever she's gone...

Blinding lights burst throughout our little haven through the windows provided, shredding any sense of sight through the air with its bright and insensible sword.

A crack of thunder only seasons further on the gloomy mood. _BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMmmm..._

With the loss of my auburn irises gingerly regaining itself, the room hazily returns to its semi-darkness. Rain patters endlessly on the wooden beams above, only assuring our woken members of an unstoppable onslaught. The downpour feels content where it is. As I sit by myself, strained eyes hovering about my friends and sighting their own holding of bearings, a certain pair of pink-eyes—a duo of them—ensconces beside me with a harrumph. "The rain bothers me. I feel as if Munaah's tears are trying to drown us."

Beside her grouchy companion, the blue female of the pink-eyed ones scoots closer to me on the other side from my corner. "Ember... I feel as if she couldn't possibly return. Llana... we saw it. We all did. We understand what happened and we know this could not possibly occur another time. Stella was there and... you were there... and Darkie was there... and Munaah and everyone and they're gone now." I can't help but shiver and bump back at each announcement of those words, ringed with names that have died. "They're gone, Llana, they're gone, Ember, they're gone they're gone they're gone. Lady Munaah is gone." As is to prove her point, Cheeka mumbles the latter name again under her breath, slowly, as if feeling the power of her death.

"One cannot help but feel anxious when their enemy that was upon them prior has a chance of rebuttal," grumbles the just-as-small pansear to my other side. Again, unable to cooperate, I just shake my head.

"I don't like hearing her name tossed about... but she couldn't possibly be alive still."

"Yes." Ember gives a haughty agreement. "There's not a way that twisted monster could crawl out of her grave, especially to give such a... spectacular displaa..." The last of his final word slips into the pocket of a thunderclap. Seeing my jump, the fire type merely chuckles—though it's grim and dry, as a laugh from Ember would be expected to form. "But... I can't help to feel uneasy."

Cheeka sighs from my left. Luminescent, pink orbs poke holes into the inky darkness only broken by swift scribbles of lightning. "I feel that if I succumb to such emotions, I'll explode." Unfortunate to understand that the panpour calling herself an explosion is really quite close to the truth. Her mutant overgrowth of psychic energy, caused in fact by earlier procedures of Lady Munaah and whatever buddies were around at the time, possibly just Darkie herself, cannot sit still inside the unstable, spindly body of Cheeka. As if to prove the point, she puffs an angry breath and pillows her long, blue locks of hair into her face, diluting the sting of pink, glowing eyes.

In fact, this seems to allow such end to conversation that Ember leaves my right side to sit with the girl on my left, possibly to calm her. I do know, as all else do, that they are quite very... close. And it's nice, it's nice that celestial beings like themselves can still find comfort, even in the most painful of nights, or the hazardous of storms, such as the one above us. I can only imagine Zoey huddled up in a lonely little corner, the wet stench of wood thick in her nose and vile on her tongue as she tries to ride out the thunder and lightning. If I could find her, I feel I would stay with her. This display of light and sound honestly doesn't dig into my scales that deeply. It only reminds me of Stella... and wreaks a slight pang of sadness in my heart...

For a time, short or long or most likely in between, the pigments of white do not infiltrate the black of the clouds, and the gentle addition of cool, calm, collected raindrops only cloud us comfortably in our slightly-crowded, though a relaxing sort of crowded, home. Our home. I hold onto that word again, try to remember that Lady Munaah is dead now.

And this is how it goes, a loophole in my brain that swings on and string me in: the pastel colored psychic and her pastel-colored corpse, a sort of pink that not even blood could cover. Lady Munaah—a munna as suggested with a pointedly simple name for herself—used to be at large for a time, connected with her throng of weak minions and disastrous friends who could not help but fall into heaps of trouble. And that trouble revealed to her as the Bittercold she is—was—and gave her a sort of power... an insane power surely, one that allotted with immense, unstoppable prowess to control, that feeling of control stuck in her pastel-purple hooves where she can control and hold together and _have, _to_ have_ something... and to lose, in the end, to her mindless addles. I guess... somewhere, I have something... opposing to Munaah. That faithful light in my heart that guided my friends to me, that strung us together as well... and enjoined us when Lady Munaah could only crumble apart. Though this could technically be my own madness, would it be called?

I can only wish that we never lose each other: especially after... Elijah...

The current and ongoing lack or ignorance of storm-like notions seems to suggest that the burly, black clouds have shushed themselves and will soon leave. But again, with a sharp cry, goes the child-like call of a miniature clap, and a brilliant white light streaks across the sky. Any doubts have been cleanly sliced in half. The storm has merely met with a... shallower midsection. However longer it goes is completely out of our hands and paws.

Almost as if in a chant, low rumbles spring about all over again in the wake of the rains, currently blotting out any noise from our pokemon once more. Ember and Cheeka could be up to innumerably anything just to my side due to the constant jump of growling, griping storm just above and encircling us, encasing our group in a thick bit of shadowed weather. That does not worry me although, as the simian duo are quite trustworthy—they clasp onto the title friend as well, and they are. They are.

Another spring, another bout, another round of chants, this time the thunder even beginning to form words that spiral like dark clouds in my brain and almost, just barely miss of forming coherent thoughts or sentences, even. Bits of sense, particles of logic, each of their forlorn pieces swirling and coating me without a sense of purpose. It could be anything; it could be nothing. It could be nothing. It's as if I'm falling into a thing called that funks; it's like I'm shouldering the world on my back, and bleak hopelessness looms on ahead. Which is impossible, with Munaah's death.

Then, in the cry of a wispy, breathless face, words chill me:

"_Brreeeeaaaatthheeee..eeee.e...eeeeeeeee...eeeee...ee..."_

Breathe. Both air and verbal use choke down my throat together, a sort of chilling mixture destined to rot inside of me. Breathe. My hands slam into trunk-like fists, useless and uncomfortable but necessary and fearful. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe. The wind has to be playing with my brain, picking along the slimy and pink cords, choosing between the smaller or the thicker and toying in there, toying in there. Like she could... exist... when she can't... when she can't. It's like a seesaw of emotions hurtling off one way and into me from another, swishing back and forth with a hearty show of _crreeeaaaak, creeaaaaakk, _clanging to the chime of bells and tune of a madman: and therefore none indeed.

When again, the voice rattles me from frozen skull to frozen toes: _"Iiiinnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn..."_

In. Breathe in. Breathe in, Llana, breathe in. Don't let it get to you. This is nothing. This is nothing. And yet I never escape it. I never escape this fear. This drug of control, taking me down with it. Bittercold cannot prevail when there is no hate to supply it; I cup my head in my spindly, scaled fingers and squeeze my eyes tightly shut. Breathe in. Breathe in. Pretend they're your words; swallow and forget. Breathe in.

Whether or not the wind speaks back to me, I crash into a limp heap on the wooden floorboards like a clap of the storm above as stars chase my closing pieces of vision and seem to mock me... like I'm losing a battle...

But there are no battles.

"_Llana, there is a battle." I jolt to a sense without feet to propel me or hands to sprawl out and grasp the ground at—and there is no ground, of course. Only mist. Mist swirling and twirling without a care. It has no care. It needs no care. All that looms in front of me in her all-seeing presence and unidentifiable tone is a someone, a someone I cannot recall. Cotton hides in the cells of my mind, snuffing it out._

_The character—different than the first, if the first existed at all—speaks it again. "There is a battle."_

_I turn my attention to the tone, strict and sweet but strong and much more overwhelming, as if it holds a cool, calm control. A cause. A worth... a... "There cannot be a battle. Lady Munaah is dead."_

"_Lady Munaah was a sniveling ditz who had nothing to do with anything at all." Her—her—accent, clearer, only seems to strengthen to that powerful presence... royalty, it would seem. But at the same time... no. I know someone else like that. But is this her or...? Or... "A sniveling ditz! An empty bottle! A fake; a fake! That dratted legend was wrong to think anyone less than the Bittercold would suffice for her cold little plan of... her own control. Idiocy, may I say!"_

"_Who are—oh!" I find myself unable to speak past her sharp, clear tone._

"_Llana! This may be a storm of doubt, but the downpour has not even begun. Those puny droplets do not contain even a glance at what could possibly be out there. At the Bittercold... at the fulmination behind desolation, beyond layers upon layers of lie. But is it a good lie?"_

_I squeak, jump back. "H-how could I know?!"_

_Somehow, I feel the cool gaze slice through me neatly without churn or mess of the kind, almost like a warning. "Who knows whether or not it's a good lie!"_

"_Who are you?!" I cry out. "Who are you! Who are you!" _

_To that, she does not answer... if this even is a she. Again mist encompasses my body, and again I begin to doubt whom exactly is the presence I feel close to me. At first it truly did seem like her—the fluffy __one; my dear Stella—but the drawling on and changes seemed to excuse that... and now I cannot even tell the gender of the tone as it deepens and grows sharp, fat, thick, and heavy, and listless. _

_Soon it comes to my attention that the drawl only goes on without another word, and its way of tone has lost order or sense of speech. Without further ado halts the mist, halts the dreams and whatever holds me suspended, and soon darkness meets my gaze again._

Occasional booms outside of my ruffled though oddly comfortable position suggests of a storm continuing to hang strong, though a falter or another proves the breaking of its hold. Soon enough, the sky will recover its eggshell blue composure and the rumbles will cease, as if the world has been fed well enough by the rainwater provided and bellyaching—quite literal of the sort—shall end. Though how soon is the question in continuous pursue.

Such cool, undisturbed silence allows me to figure who currently sits near me, almost as if watching over my sleeping form. The poking and prodding of otherwise prim and soft bedding seems to skewer me open on just that feeling, that notion of the presence seeming to choke me through with its standing and staring. Of course I know who occupies the room; his quiet self, though not quite so stealthy, signifies this—and thankfully kills any wonder of whether or not I could be accompanied by... Tim. He shattered what I felt in my heart prior: the comfort and warmth and joy and... Sucking in a breath, pushing the dark and collective eyes from my head, I pull back into the silky blankets of warmth that remind me of my friendships—of my entities: my pokemon. They're... mine. And I'm theirs as well.

Stirring, I give a slow and wavy step out of the shadowed bedding and turn open auburn orbs that flash into the quadrupedal in front of me. His watery blue ones watch over at a constant and unblinking rate; what could be fear cools me. Or perchance it is understanding. The keldo has gone through a great number of ideals too massive for us to stand or understand ourselves. "Kyo."

As expected, the red-and-blue haired creature with the glimmering horn on his forehead in question, the majestic and misty and aspiring form of pure brilliance, not even dulled out to the pallid shadows of the walls about him: he does nothing to acknowledge my greeting. So I continue on. "Kyo, I trust you've been well over these past few sunrises." And pause.

Ever since we rescued the poor soul, he doesn't seem able to take in more than a string of words at a time. I have to talk slowly and softly and cross the twisted fingers by my sides to trust he won't back off from me and slam the cavern-like blue orbs closed. Without showing such response, I take this as another sign that I'm safe to go on, one word pieced together at a time. "You and Virizion look happy."

Though she does not remain present, mentioning the nature-furred female dear to him always lightens the hard, cold stare Kyo gives off. Whatever state he's in, he cannot drop that name. Virizion never drops his as well. I seem capable enough to hold this sort of conversation with—toward: no responses—the frigid one, but honestly... it seems that other dear members of my team struggle to connect with him.

Another part of me. Of my personality. Of my affiliation. I cannot fight, but I can talk to silent strangers that seem to hate pokemon. Don't worry; if one fear is a self-conscious enemy, I could possibly chat their pains away. If only life was that easy. Enemies declare war, declare hate and insanity, impure status and hard-struck blows, cut by cut and chunk by chunk until only the strong one remains. This in mind, I try to flick out the hard-thought emotions before Kyo senses them in me and closes himself.

We—Virizion and I especially—trust to eventually open him up again, to restore the legendary he is to himself again. Each of us, all of us can relate at least slightly with the works of... of that place, and take in the knowledge that he is the longest-stayed captive, the most delusional, the most in pain, no matter how immortal he could be.

Seeing his relaxation, I continue speaking to the one with the glimmering horn. "You look quite happy today." Through what little emotion Kyo shows, it's true—his eyes nearly shine like the horn. The cavernous orbs almost appear more like eyes rather than sockets of deep, dark nothingness locked inside a skull. And that's... improvement. "The weather is pretty as well."

Another pause. Even though this is how the keldeo works now, a hot, embarrassed prick seems to melt in my stomach at how lengthy my waits are. As well, I've never completely grown steady in tongue. Though I now release myself to the members of my team much more, I cannot fully shake away that heavy sense of an awkward sort of fumble through tone alone.

"The home is warm, and sweet on the tongue as well. A kind scent for one..." A thirst driving from the pit of my heated stomach so desperately wishes to ask him in any cry at all for Kyo to smile. His muzzle faces me, cream-colored and shining, but only a dull cut indicates any lips at all; I doubt he's smiled since he found himself in... the palace, as it was prior. He must have been scared and cold and sure of nothing, sure of death and pain and... he must have suffered an awful deal for far too long. Far... far too long.

A soft sadness weighs me down, snuffing out the shame, as Kyo blinks a slow response. I understand none of what he wishes to speak, but he appears to be... in a sort of blanketed appearance, perchance defrosting from his pain. Perchance. I can't trust him to get well soon, I can't ask him to smile... he's insecure and afraid and... sad... Not even could I reach out and offer any sort of physical comfort. Kyo would dart back, shy away, and if I could somehow corner him... he would unleash a frenzy of fear and strike with an animosity in his eyes, a look without control.

So I struggle for a way to end conversation. It would end coldly if I stuttered or stopped. Perchance... to thank him for watching over me as he had. I think Kyo would appreciate the recognition.

"Thank you for your time to watch over me."

Heart hammering in my chest, the tightness squeezes further as he doesn't blink again and only stares back through dark, liquid orbs before finally nodding just the slightest tip and allowing me to excuse myself. I truly, truly do want the disordered creature of glimmering presence and long, beautiful locks of fur to release from his own torpor and heal. And though it hurts now, especially in an attempt of conversation with him, one sunrise we could awake and see an expression fitting to the "prideful and childish smirk" Virizion spoke kindly of prior. I want him to recover, nearly more for the grassy green one with such heartfelt feelings for him than for his own good—but I suppose the ideals match together anyways.

With a slugmaish step, nearly tossing me into a select few walls already hurtled with the long stretches of pounding rain—though now such pounding dies into gentle thrums—I manage to stumble my way through our haven's small allot of hallways and land for an intact heap in the front areas of our home, where the door still sits, though somewhat soggy from the downpour. Judging by the amount of care Gurdurr and his crew did use on creating our home in the first place, and how much rain we do have, I doubt the wood should be mortally wounded from the affair.

I then slink to the ground, forking into a less slouched position, and listen with lids just slightly pulled close to the dying whisper of waters as they squirm about and rain themselves away. A peaceful feeling, brushed unto me quickly after my consulting with—to—Kyo, shall his soul rest easy in the future. The soft-to-ear buzzes of conversation floating above a losing storm calm and wrap themselves up in my heart as I rest and lie in wait for the rain to end. At one point or another, the pink-eyed duo of Ember and Cheeka seem to shift into my presence, happily welcoming my wakening.

"You're a good egg, Llana," coos the dew-furred girl to my one side, stringing my arm into her side and leaning against me.

Ember chortles a soft, husky tune to my other. "Well, she's not cracked. Zoey is."

"I don't think Zoey is cracked," she murmurs back.

"I like Zoey."

"Of course you do, Llana. You're Llana."

As our conversation, soft and lulling and inviting, toys about us, I recall my dream from prior—surely I'll have to tell this to my friends, especially the mutants beside me. They know Stella; they'll be likely in direness to be alert of this as well. I will, I deliberate, I will eventually. Though not now. Not now but soon, I believe.

Conversation steadily takes a toll on the atmosphere, finally covering up any sound or pitter-patter of rain.

**Ah... these chapters are really interesting to write. I feel like I'm not writing enough since they are relatively small compared to what I was writing just a couple months ago, this story is pretty... I dunno. Different than the other one. Llana's special.**

**Tim: Llana's special.**

**Me: Go away, Tim. **


	4. UnexpectedUnwanted Bodies

Chapter 4: Unexpected/Unwanted Bodies

Out with the old; in with the new. Whatever ruffled feelings held to our lands prior for the rain, I like to believe their hollow ways have washed off as of now. With the weather clear and the sky peeking out to see us again, just as it should be, the soft, soggy scent of aftermath—of after-storm—sits like dust, like mildew, on our front. It's a hefty stench, though not as unpleasant as it should feel, what with its overcompensating taste that one cannot seem to rid of until much after the aftermath of the rain. I like it, personally. Zoey as well enjoys the change; one can see her drippy footprints marching outside our log home and tossing open the door: crunches and splashes from outdoors suggests where she's gone with herself.

Puddles. Such an innocent one... The thought of the little oshawott traipsing and pouncing on bright blue splotches in the earth nigh in my eyesight brings in warm, sunny notions tied to. Still like the wood holding up the floor beneath me, like the wood piecing together the wall behind me, like the wood covering the ceiling above me, I sit in shadow. It's a peaceful shadow, like: images from both my mind and melancholic journeys keep me company.

Funny, how I seem at calm will to just stay here in the dark alcove of the room itself, a nook in the midst of a great, bountiful and altogether pleasant area. And here I sit. Somewhere nearby, Kyo must be in the chamber that once contained... that once held Elijah and Bay and Virizion. Bay spread out for another room to let her be at peace with the one at ill will... and still, Kyo must sit as well, in the turmoil and havoc he's felt for too long and longer. However he'll recover is a mystery I'm not even sure could be answered. But... he has to. For the grassy-green quadrupedal watching over him so painstakingly much with the knowledge he could lay to waste—he should do it for her in the least.

A soft-padded foot moves over the floorboards. Whether from laziness or just a desire to not care, I don't move myself or open my eyes. Perchance they'll see me; perchance not. The word teammate used to describe the beings I've met and gotten to know here holds much more inside of it than its original sound. I couldn't be peeved from notice or not.

But of course the aforementioned is practical thinking. "Hello, Llana."

And of course the one being I can't seem to sit still near—and not in a pleasant way—sends himself in front of me. In a weak attempt to hold a clear, cool stance, to be like Stella, I don't open my eyes and simply reply with, "Top of the morning."

"Open your eyes."

"I can close my eyes if I want to. They are mine."

"I could pull them open."

A gap in my maw nearly destroys the facade, but I try to brush it off. I'm fine. "What is it with you and my auburn orbs, Tim?"

The deep, black tone in response: "For the Sweethot, you seem to hold quite the grudge." Which of course cracks through me and forces my eyes to widen open at the smoky-furred being in front of me.

"T-Tim..! I..."

A hardened smirk scales to his murky eyes. "You can't get around that." And he's right. If I deny it, I would have to somehow show off a way that proves I don't feel so uncomfortable about his dark, indefinable aura; to oblige means a crack in me: a crack I can't have. So I lower my head to the ground. Perchance I can avoid answering.

"No, I cannot void it; I cannot nullify your words or snuff them out." Pinching my fingers together, I will the rushing in my heart to stop. It's as if the chords have tightened and throttled my throat's own in a single knot destined to crush me of life. "For a regular entity, you sure seem to have something against me."

His eyes narrow; through a wheezing gasp I deliberate how well a play I'd done. "Not bad." Tim slowly shakes his head side to side as if choosing out where to strike me first—like I'm his sort of prey. "Not bad at all, Llana." And a chortle drawls through like a polluted stream between us.

In an attempt for cover, I skirt about the floor, auburn orbs picking up none but slightly-dappled lines of sunshine finally breaking through. This doesn't help me, though—not with my current situation, as it is. I do appreciate the breakthrough of sun from those clouds in the night, but I doubt any rays could somehow silence the timburr sitting and leaning in front of me to just an angle so that I cannot slide out of my nook without his interference: a probable outcome. Unfavorable; probable.

"I don't have something against you, Llana. But you are... peeved by me. You take notice, don't you?"

"M-maybe I do." My heart spikes into my throat. Just... stop, Tim... stop looking at me like I'm some delicacy for you to savor... that stare seems to find me almost... tantalizing, really... My scales itch from under the eyes. Stop; stop; stop. "I do take notice of you... You have thi—"

Should I tell him that it's like he's gouging with claws deep beneath my pale grass-colored scales from every look? How does one explain to another just how grueling, just how cutting, just how violated they make them feel? Could I even try to put such thoughts into words—such purgatory? Tim could slap me for that. His thick, burly arms ensure this; would he slap me if I told him? Or... what would he... what would... he... A flash of smoky fur instinctively cringes me back. My head bangs into the wall but I bite my lip and shove it back.

In sudden note, Tim's eyes, tracing over the events like a foreboding spectator the victim only knows will raise no finger of help, snap back at me and fill with a slight sort of film: a light enshrouds the pupil and even—just slightly—expands, through and through, from mid to end. He blinks. "I... scare you." Without waiting for a response, a confirmation, anything, he whispers it again: "I scare you."

And then the orbs flicker over me, now representing a fire harmed in the process of a downpour: the storm has returned in... him? Could it... Why does he look so... "T-Tim..."

"You're empathetic with me," he states blatantly, though with a soft lull in it, deep and dark tone throttled down some. "With me."

"Yes..." When the timburr doesn't respond, my heart squeezes and I mumble, "Yes..?"

As is forgetting conversation, the lightened orbs glimmer and turn back from me, as does the timburr himself. And honestly, Tim has morphed so suddenly from a creature with inscrutable and a terrifying aura who laughed at what he wanted and felt so... foreboding; now he's almost... vulnerable in stance. Hung back like a shadow, head bent down toward me. How did he do that?

How does one like him change so easily? Before I ask, he goes on: "Of course you are, though... you're special... you're special, obviously." Ah... "You look back at me with such a queer little piece of empathy... it's unnerving. I suppose I'm... unnerving to you, though."

"Tim..." Shame warms in my cheeks and stomach.

"I started it." And again those dark orbs flash down on me, seemingly darker than... prior. "And now I apologize for what I caused you to think of the sort." The low tone catches me off like a slap to the face.

He's... "Apologize?"

"Yes; apologize." Like black, misty wax, his bent head and body bend over to me further in... acquiesce—sorrow?—obeisance? Any sort of... wh-what? Tim? He's acting quite... out of the character I've grown accustomed to avoiding... "I'm sorry. May you learn to forgive me." With that word, Tim unfolds himself, offers another stiff nod of his head, and, like a fog, disperses from sight. For a moment my breath simply collapses in my chest and I don't know what to think. I thought the burly, smoky-furred creature was a monster, if anything. A crazy madman ready to cut me open and... of other notions... at the drop of a tail, a signal or whatnot. And here Tim... wishes for my forgiveness?

Is he going to change or something? Should I trust... him..? My heart drops in my chest, growing icy with each passing moment, and I don't know. I don't know what to think. Just prior... back... further prior, before even the Glacial Palace... he acted quite odd as well but much more in the dark demeanor as a beast of a pokemon. Whether he's changed or not can only wait in my mind, wait until further notice.

Still winded, I struggle to my feet in a rapid flurry of squirm. Somehow my pale toes settle and I lean against the wooden wall behind me, just trying to suck in breaths and allow, if not understand: I doubt understand could happen anytime soon. With those foreboding dagger-like gleams of glances Tim constantly railed at me, I seem unable to focus. In an effort to get over his words, to just throw them out and allow, I suppose, I pile my scaled fingers in front of me and stare at the waggling green chinks of armor-like skins set upon, shivering from the event. As my eyes narrow and struggle to puncture their tiny chambers, control the shaky palms, this somehow links to my own amount of levelheadedness, thus enforcing my squeezed lungs to begin refilling regularly and altogether setting my body in a more routinely motion once more.

Somehow I seem capable of moving myself and leaving my supportive wall section, waving the corner away and beginning to finally leave this musty, rained-at chamber once and for all. Each step propels me on into what I know must be bright, cheery rows of sunshine like crops just waiting to be nurtured and used to its leisure. As such wooden door squeaks open for me, allowing a handful of dappled light across the wood and my own figure, a sight alights to me. Silence covers our little Paradise, as do the thick rows of feet possessed by a number of creatures standing up to another of similar build:

one male and another—both faces with gritted teeth and smoldering black eyes for the grassy-green one next to them. Their agreement without even uttering a word causes a new-found shiver to spark alight on my back and I cling for the door, hanging and hiding partially behind its wooden core and watching.

Virizion and some other important-looking characters. They're on edge. They're upset; she's upset—with each other? With just her? Cringing furthermore, I continue to haul brown furnishing in my hands and shake to myself. Perhaps I should do something...

The dangerous look of a white-muzzled face opts otherwise. I believe Stella's told me against getting in the way of upset legends prior. But I could... lie here... in case... The light boiling across the floor of our house now only appears meddlesome, angry. It trickles on endlessly like a stream though, nothing I can do to stop it. I mean I... I could but... the tension thickens around the group, and I feel isolated amongst their kind, hiding feebly behind a bit of tree bark like an idiot fop. But Stella... Stella...

Like thunder's intensity, the creatures seem ready to pounce, muscles rippling over their interesting pelts, ready to charge and crackle at each other with no surefire whatsoever. At a safer distance, I analyze Virizion's new... visitors—older than I'd think, they appear to be. One holds an ocean-colored flank like a cover over his lithe, agile figure, with gently pointed toes: foamy white drizzled beneath alongside a white muzzle of similar order. The horns on his head, dark like watery pebbles, match his stone-cold eyes. His partner, a bulkier figure of more awkward standards, seems more as a bodyguard than any relation to him—with varying colors of gray to his massive pelt and brown stripes, lining up to his thick, black horns and eyes... I shudder through my meager protection.

My dear friend seems at such point as well, and she speaks first. "What are you doing here?"

"You cannot escape me, Sister." The blue one, the non-bodyguard, replies.

Her eyes flash back a dangerous violet—poison from an old enemy's ruby-red claws is flung back at me in memory. Toxic... that... deceased toxicroak, as I recall. "I can. I am surrounded now, as you can see, by others that care and love for me as I do them." In a flick of her fluffy, green-horned face, for a moment I seem to have caught her deep, dark pupils. A signal..? Seeing this is the legend herself in a sticky situation, it most likely could have been a warning for me: Virizion's style, as is.

As the blue one goes on, his tone begins to reach a regal sort of speech, one demanding to be bowed down for, with salty holes in the midst Zoey would feel empathy for: "Sister dearest, I am your one and only brother as I will always be. You are the Virizion as I am Cobalion"—his name—"and you could never leave me. We are connected."

"We a-are... not." Still, Virizion swallows down her gentle, nature-filled tone with such soft wisdom as she stands up to the male against her. "We are not. You mean nothing to me, Cobalion. Nothing at all."

With a smirk, his slate-colored orbs—so dark compared to his sister's, the sister I do love, as she told him her friends do, with a terrible yammering in my soul as he stares her down—flicker back toward the bulky one. "You cannot escape me; you cannot escape us. I told you I had plans. I told you we would find you a suitable mate."

Mate.

He means the... the boulder-like creeper beside him. My heart sets a frenzied tandem, attempting multiple leaps straight out of my throat with chords yanking it back every time. Blood in my veins pumps harder and the wood under my fingers begins to creak and crack fearfully. He means... not...

Not Kyo. Not the vulnerable little keldeo behind, the one my dear nature-associated friend's heart belongs to, as seen too many times to count; too many times to break any sort of vow, any sort of ploy this brother holds. Perchance I should feel upset she never spoke of this creature, but... she seems at ill will. She doesn't like him; she willed to forget him. What a shame immortals like she and he are only destined to meet once more.

Again, her eyes waver for me. But they only sit momentarily—another warning. Be ready. Be ready. My feet bunch above the wood, a sudden surge of adrenaline pumping throughout my body like myself soon to be rushing through the fields and unto Virizion, unto whatever is amongst us.

"I found you a somebody: Terrakion. He will be suitable, I'm sure, for your fragile little needs. Suitable enough." A crazed stare enters the sea-like quadrupedal, and his voice is interrupted regularly with a panting wheeze, automatically switching my mind again to Toxic; to Purrple, her fat-skinned feline friend; to Lady Munaah, the puppeteer only controlled by an even stronger will... How shameful the entire cycle goes.

And here it is again, straight in front of me. Tensing, but not quite ready to spring, the grassy-green one dear to me whispers in a low, taut squeak: "I told you to stop. I told you to stop many times."

"You cannot make me stop, dear Sister."

"I can run... I can hide... and still you pursue me... and with this excuse of a reason you continue to belittle, to enshroud me in your grace, is it?" Though her eyes don't reek of the vile craziness her brother's slate-gray do, Virizion seems ready to snap; soon, pounds my heart, soon indeed. Soon indubitably. A wheeze breaks her soft, sweet tone. "What is it with you..? Why do you..? Why—"

A sneer as filthy as the requests Cobalion files out so easily, so rotted, plasters over the foamy-white muzzle of his. "We have power, Sister, power we could use for quite anything. We can shape this world or break it—it's all a choice of our own, no? And I have to say... it's quite... enjoying... to use it as a weapon... to see others lie before me... to see their hearts filled overflowing with me... me..." He breaks into rigid lines of laughter. "Me. And you must fall to your knees for me as well. And I shall reward you...

"You will live with me, and you will have this mate to replace that broken creature of yours, and you can feel love. A real love. Better love. Much better."

Apparently Virizion has reached the conclusion before me: Cobalion, as majestic as he appears, is... quite... rabid in form. Insane. He acts without any sort of control and demands for others to see him. He... He... I seem unable to resemble him to... to Tim any longer, but to a prior time, that... would fit. The smoke-furred timburr and sea-furred legend seem to go hand-in-paw too well... or did, if Tim truly feels remorse.

Somehow, I manage to pick up Virizion as she speaks so softly, to such lower standards I struggle to maintain what she does say.

"Kyo is mine, and you cannot harm him."

The words break through my skull and send swaths and catches of feelings prior to Virizion's wide, dark orbs again facing me as she stares for a long, few moments and bunches herself into a leap against the... brother.

Quite a brother.

And I see, this is where I come in. She knew where I lay, and perchance Cobalion and his friend... that bulky Terrakion sought me out as well, but they did not call to me as my friend does now. They do not know me; they do not understand me; they cannot understand us. Us: such a stronger word, enforcing Virizion and myself, our entities tied by a single word to empower the water quadruped and his boulder of a... pet, even. Of a pet. His petty little minion, perchance? At the thought of a powerless creature sulking along behind, his face painted pink so easily, so quickly, so painstakingly, I hurl off the thoughts and shoot from the murky depths of a half-dappled chamber, ribbons of light streaming after me. I'd like to say that soon after I burst into a storm of battle—but of course I cannot battle.

Instead, I... Instead...

His eyes lurch into mine with a force not even dagger-like claws could muster, pulling through writhing tendons and streaming lines of blood. "I believe you're the filthy one," he states so calmly, tone not even changing as his green-colored sister stains his fur a hopeless wisp of purple, misty blood clogging over his watery furs. "Yes, quite right." He casually flicks a claw into her cream face as one would pluck a berry from the ground, a deep gouge rippling over soft, pale cheeks and tissues.

Eyes of madness beat down on me like wings. "You... you're..."

Even without a response, his eyes widen: insanity or purity does not answer, but a dark, mottled body slamming past me to take the raise of a bloodied, blue paw shall and will; with a startling black display, Tim ripples into our colorful pelts and bodies clumped together. Cobalion's eyes still remained trained over mine; he seems to take a step closer to cracking open brain cells the longer he looks and begins a rhythm-like pant, back and forth through the air collecting in front of his face.

"Tim!"

"Just because you're so Sweethot doesn't mean you can run into battle like that," the low voice swings back as do his feet, and a well-noticed log removes from his back to bludgeon a tear in Cobalion's skull: a _CRACK _proves this, jutting the entire world as it falls apart in front of me. He doesn't stop to wipe the blot of blood cutting red into a portion of his face; a flustered, leafy hand of my own attempts to wipe it back enough, and Tim goes on: "I suppose this is one way to win a girl's heart."

He... he just... An indignant squeak falls from my mouth and I wipe away stray, red dots resulting from the charge from my scales._ Win a girl's heart, _he called it, w_in a girl's heart. _I recall how... red... and wounded... and... so... weak... Elijah's shaking state held. One could hardly tell his real fur color was yellow, with gentle, sloping waves of white to cover undersides and a cap-like mark of black upon his head and back. All dyed a heavy red I doubt his... slowly decomposing... corpse... has rid of...

It's a hard thought to swallow. I want to cry again; I want to go back and hide again in those confines of my home with its wonderful shadows to sneak into and pretend, at least, none but smiles can write upon my heart. And then there's Tim.

Then there's Tim.

Perchance he sighted how savagely Virizion attacks her own brother, or just her heart tucked behind her ear through every attack to the blue-furred loon, but a fluffy hand escapes battle to clench mine and he drags us both back. His long, thick, powerful legs catch onto Paradise's gentle grasses to follow back the path, back toward the brown and well-trodden rode a boulder-like pest had ran for prior. As we gain distance and a gray presence intensifies with detail and means of an exit, Tim fingers his log and tosses the wooden tool, its nature-held entity whacking Terrakion on his blunt head with a _WHUMP. _He skitters to the ground on all black toes and doesn't attempt to stick his head up again. A brisk trot allows the timburr to regain his bit of tree, and with a disgruntled snort toward the only—trustfully—unconscious legend, we watch.

My fingers tingle; when am I supposed to remove myself? Should I not escape now? I mean I... I like it when... Elijah did that... Tim is... Tim is...

He speaks first: "It would be irrational for you to suddenly trust me."

"It would," I murmur, agreeing. "It would. I am well aware that you know how to fight." Rather, I can... trust him, if not only here. When do I let go? When do I let go?

A chortle, babbling near like an old, algae-coated creek of ancient times, runs from him. "Indeed, Llana." He eyes me, goes on. "I didn't think, nor should I, that you'll suddenly come to like me. That again is... irrational. But I can hope you'll give me another chance."

The way he used that... hope... "Hope... that's—er..." I silence myself. For an unknown notion, a prickling sense settles on me to stop sharing my voice. It's... weird, now, to be as quiet as I once was.

"Hope. You. It's your... destiny." No one else toys with those words but him, I note. None but Tim pesters me on the topic, on the spot of my destiny. "I figure already your abiding is necessary. How you work... whatnot." Dark orbs shoot ahead, carefully examining the boulder-still slumped form of the legend.

Though he'd silenced himself, the smoke-colored mammal seems terse, as if waiting for me to speak of something else; it's a quick recall to our earlier... chat. And I... it's been quite a going of time since I started questioning it but never brought such topic to my lips. "Why do you... like me so much?"

"It has something to do with why Darkie was so intent on me... back then." He responds so smoothly—expecting it? "I don't take back what I'd told you prior, though it did frighten you or not: you are an interesting one."

"I feel that you're the interesting one—honestly."

A bare-toothed grin accompanies my blank slate of a face. "You're interesting. You are."

"Ah... of course I am."

Eventually, we come to the conclusion that we should find our dear Quagsire and report to the omnipotent being himself that we'd found a pair of legends attempting to sack Virizion. Once finding her and gathering our new unconscious buddies, our odd little group sets out for the sun shining high above a snug, wooden structure in the midst of a not-as-barren Post Town. Whether or not I forget to release the hand seems a forgotten notion by now: old; stale; unimportant.

**Me: Aaaye, almost forgot about Quagsire. But you can't because he's Quaaagsireeeeee. Yeeeeee~ **

**Tim: -snort-**

**Me: This little scene here with Virizion confronting her brother and future-mate she hadn't even known about prior (the mate, not the brother) is something I'd planned a looong time ago. Like back when I wrote that first story. Long time. It's one of the few ideas I made for this sequel that actually got in at all—though I changed Cobalion from the mate to brother as I wrote. Sounded better. Terrakion would've just been a sort of minion lackey kind of grunt. I like this more, though. Feels more put together. Thorough. Stuff... well, as thorough as a fanfiction gets.**

**Thank ye for supporting this quirky little read. ^^**

**Tim: It's been four chapters.**

**Me: Learn to be thankful. It's good.**


	5. To Rename Oneself

Chapter 5: To Rename Oneself

Huddled about a small, circular, and yet cozy brown table is where I soon find myself, squished beside a green-furred legend with muscles threateningly bunching nigh on my scaled side; a shadow-like mammal brooding over one subject or another with his powerful, fear-induced aura to my other; unconscious enemies tossed into an effortless pile to the side; and a floppy-faced friend with a bright smile either way.

"So basically..." The one straight across of me blinks almost shyly. "Mm—mm! Y'all... found these here crimmmminals... trespassing? Threatening to boot Virizion's mmmmmate as well?" The deep, cheery voice titters off course. "Mmmmmmm—mm—mm—mm—mm—mmmmm..." And he just shakes his large, blue head, the dark, clouded orbs now amass with a sorrow. "Shame creatures like themmmm try this to creatures like us. Mm..."

Nearby, a well-recognized swanna patters between tables, her glossy wings letting off a sheen as blue, webbed toes give quack-like squeaks through treads over wood. Her long neck stays poised up and pointed for any customers remaining as a swatch of fabric in her feathery wing scrubs over unused tables. She hums to herself as she works, so peaceful with the life bestowed on her: eyes match mine every once in awhile, as if assuring this is how life is meant to be. And I almost believe her. Just... just about.

She's Mary, for crying out loud; she's practically an unannounced leader nearly every time I run into her. Kindness pools from her like no other, elegance shimmers across her broad, white figure, and we know somewhere inside the swanna has power locked up in her that she could use if she needs it. The true question is why she decides against any sort of head skill; quiet in her inn, cleaning up others and brightening their day as she does, she doesn't seem to mind so much. But sometimes I'd rather we switched places—Mary surely would be a revolutionary Sweethot. And yet fate plays her here; and she looks happy, though sometimes it's hard to tell how much she builds up for us.

"Mm... Mmmmaaaaryy..." mumbles the more-than-just-slightly distracted quagsire. Again I instinctively wonder what his name could be. He doesn't say much, just mumbles about the swanna as she works.

Virizion's cheeks encircle one another and fill with blush. "Um, Quagsire? Do we have a matter here that is a little more... pressing than Mary is? Could we please solve this first?" I don't know how rude it is to waken Quagsire from the swanna-ridden stupor, or if he'll grow angry and exponentially powerful shall I move.

"Fiiiiine," comes the only barely-annoyed phrase. But quickly Quagsire shakes off any emotion having to do with the Mary in question and replaces his passion-colored orbs with the mist-like fog usually surrounding their true intentions. "Mmmmmkay. So we have a reason they've shown."

Invigorated by his regard, the nature-dressed legendary's muscles spring further taut by my head as she stands and looks the floppy one in the eye. "Indubitably." A pause. Funny how much we take that word for granted. Even Mary stops to wink at hearing it spoken—like a spell, nary. "My brother showed to attempt and wrangle me into the idiot idea in his head that he can hold himself high above everyone else and force me up there too: as a sort of pedestal—or perchance just to keep him company? That I'm unsure. The thick, brown imbecile beside is apparently my to-be mate."

"Well apparently he doesn't know the difference between a girl in love and one without," yawns the blue amphibian in one breath. "Especially one so visibly showing off her love. Mm-mm. Mmmm-mmmmm..." He shakes his head a few times, each motion only softer, sadder than the last. "It's a durn shamme."

"Yes..." Virizion's eyes skirt for the bodies. "What do we do with them, though?"

"Mm! Right! Prolly shouldn't leave those lying around, see'mmmm get'n trouble sommmmewhere... That wouldn't do." Knocking off the quavery composure, our dear quagsire stares out into his mind for a moment and pulls from an idea. "Mmmmmmmkay. We've got this nice li'l Mmmmmystery Dungen summmmat round here... It's called... mm... Sunlit Dais. Heard it was good for disposing legends and the like." With a final wink, Quagsire appears ready to take up his leave and visit with the feathered one further behind him.

But the legend beside me nearly jumps to her feet, forcing me to flinch back from those pulsating muscles in her leg. I'd rather refrain from injury due to those powerful giblets of meat. "Wait, Quagsire—I was... thinking... er... of a way to be more defined than those scoundrels down there."

"Mm?"

"I wanted to... go by a name instead of... just my legend status. I know that one day you will all be naught but ashes and no one will understand the name I go by, but... it's rather important to me anyways."

"Aw, that's so cute..." He giggles childishly, and a gleam enters his big, black eyes. "Any ide—"

"Vivi! You should go by Vivi!" Realizing her sudden outburst, Mary steps back with an embarrassed squawk. "Ah, sorry; in his sleep, Kyo always would mutter that name. I'm feeling quite certain it's what he used to... er, you know, call you. And I think it's such a sweet title."

Once the swanna confirms it, there's no stopping Quagsire. "Yes! Yes! You should do that!"

Turning back, facing me with liquid purple orbs, Virizion smiles just the softest inkling of joy. Memories. A ghost of a grin, a reminder of her past with him, with Kyo. All she'll have to hold onto until he returns to a state of liveliness. "I... I like it. And you're true there, Mary. That used to be a name only... only he gave me. He said we should go by real names first, I know, and thus created Kyo and Vivi on the spot." Though the power in her limbs, especially the one by my head, seems to dwindle, she doesn't stop to cry this time around. "Okay... I'll go with it. The name is... it's a good name. Vivi it is."

And now I'll have to adjust to just that: calling her Vivi. I do like it more than just her species title. Feels more... lively. Alive. There. Just... there, a fixture in my head: Vivi the virizion, the one and only. As we remove ourselves from the chamber, Tim accompanying us outdoors—why he wouldn't come in and deliberated to watch over the doors in case a legendary could miraculously wake and escape, I don't know—somehow the weights of Vivi's friends carries over Tim's strong arms and the friend herself's back as I... emotionally motivate? Perchance. I'm still quite unsure exactly what I emanate to make me so... appealing. Perchance that's a piece of why I do have such aura.

While moving away from Post Town, we explain to the missing-in-action timburr about Vivi's choice of name. "So now you're... another name. Aye." And he leaves it at that, so we do too. He's accepted the change nicely, or at least as nicely as I think someone like Tim can.

"Where to, again?" He grunts beneath the weight of Terrakion, the boulder-like creature stumbling over his shoulders and arms. I attempt to grasp a limb or so within my own weight, but the timburr's orbs cut through me in his kind gesture for me to let go. I shudder and step back and try again later. He cannot avoid help forever.

"We have to reach a Mystery Dungeon called Sunlit Dais, apparently. Quagsire said something about it being a nice place to toss out legends. How metaphorical those words were, I'm not sure, but I'd trust him."

Black meets violet as their eyes collide. Eventually, Tim gives in and shakes himself, nigh stumbling over Terrakion's unconscious lug of a body. He reaches out a hand and grumbles a stray "don't" when I attempt to sneak back in and assist: I was close—quite close. "I'd trust him as well. He's a reliable one."

Virizi—no, Vivi—nods back. "He is, indeed."

"He is, indubitably?" I echo. If echoes could sound hollow and awkward, I would be that echo.

Black and violet thus collide unto auburn as I stumble back. "Hah," murmurs a timburr while Vivi giggles after him. Face burning, I avoid eye contact as much as I can, head tottering back and forth on my shoulders like an unimportant, insecure bit of uselessness. Like I don't carry a brain to bog me down from the inside.

Thankfully, no more comments are made. Not until our stumbling group of Paradise members with varying amount of unconscious legend held between us crunches on stumbling toes past the trodden path leading up to our home, where a mottled brown creature on a pair of legs tromps down toward us. His fur glistens with what must be sweat as he steps closer to us in a skylarking sort of bound, forth closer and faster then slow again.

My heart catches itself in a frenzy. The cheerful one continues on. A liquid gleam winks in and out of his dark orbs, shinier though than Tim's beside me. The timburr and his friend seem quite similar in shape at the least, but Burr's sudden bursts of enthusiasm cannot help to float like a stream amid our team. He's... always been here; others look up to that crafty little smile of his that assures he has a joke up his sleeve somewhere.

"Oh, jeez! Virizion! What'd you do? Did you, like, have some sorta heist over there? With pokemon who look way like you?"

Her purple orbs draw near his as he prances in place on the grasses of Paradise. We're set turned for the route leading off toward Mystery Dungeons—toward the left—wherever our ensnared group takes us. "No..." Vivi shifts beneath her lug of brother over her shoulder and wrapped behind her fluffy, green tail. "I mean, um, this is my brother and... he's Cobalion. And..." Grunting with the strain, she tosses her head sideways. "That's Terrakion."

"Are they bad guys?"

"You could say that."

Burr drills his welcoming eyes into my skin. "Llana, these guys bad? If there's anyone who won't call a good guy a bad guy, I think it'd be the unnaturally albino one. Just sayin'." Sometimes I don't know whether I should take offense or laugh off the brown one's words. His chipper grin and spring in his step suggests otherwise: Burr is a sweet boy, somewhere in his long strands of fur.

"He's... unkind to Vivi, and could think kinder of her. And... he is well acquitted to Terrakion."

"Well color me pink! Llana almost insulted someone!" He snorts. "I can't believe it. I think I'm tearing up."

"You're not tearing up," grumbles the colored stormy timburr beside me, pink ringlets in his fur bulging slightly. He's annoyed by him. I scoot back. "You also make a better mush, _brownie._" He lets out a pent-up breath. Should Tim be a fire type—like Ember, perchance—I wouldn't be surprised did he blow steam in his head and burst into an inferno of anger. He's like a boiling hot springs, ready to jump with energy and splatter us all over: Vivi, me, Burr—all of us.

Thinking of waters reminds me of the soggy mammal I label my best friend. Wherever Zoey is, may her heart be blessed. Such a naïve little oshawott...

Burr smacks his lips quite loudly. "Mm, brownie. I like it."

"I hate you."

Vivi blinks heavily between the loads of tension; my melancholic trail flashes back to an elder Mystery Dungeon, those Crags of Lament where cliffs of rocks knocked over side to side to a destructive tone: _bumpBUMPbumpBUMPbumpBUMP _back and forth without releasing until Jen fell down the crevices and nearly lost her life. My breath falls away through collapsed lungs.

Don't think of it, please.

When I struggle back into the void of reality, Burr's lips gnash lazily between muscles as his voice returns to attention. "...so anyways you totally need to bring me with you, Virizi—"

"O-oh, Burr! It's... it's Vivi, now."

"Vivi!" he plows on, again as if nothing changed in his cheerful sort of way, "even better! Brownie agrees!"

Tim's eyes smolder, and for a moment I feel as if I could reach into his coal-black eye sockets and pull out burning flames. "Stop."

"Stopping is improbable."

"Impossible," amends the fire-eyed biped. The aura lurking about him crackles: my heart nearly loses itself and chokes in the gravitational feeling of irony on the inside.

And Burr, as he is, only tramples on. "Nothing is impossible, but improbable is definitely working here." And he smiles back, bright teeth lining his brown lips most gently. Whenever he smiles, it's as if his mouth was only molded—as if sun-dried clay—for grins. I've never seen Burr frown before, either way. He seems suitable where he is now, even as upset as Tim can get. "Sooo, who's struggling the most under their buddy's weight, where're we goin', and we goin' or what?" The grin only blooms on the stem of his heart chords, connected somehow on the inside of his childish, brown soul to his lips. "Llana, you haven't said much. What's up?"

"Nothing much..."

"Aw, c'mon..!" Burr abruptly springs to his feet and pounces upon me, wrapping his thick, beefy, brown arms about me. "You're my friend; therefore you have to say what's up."

My eyes sink to the ground. He tries hard to gain another one's attention, even when that another one reveals to be a short snivy without much on her mind at the moment of inquiry. Still, the hug is warm as it drapes around me, wrapped like a scarf: Burr's limbs could sew themselves into one.

I wouldn't mind—I would quite... enjoy—my heart's warmth in the friendly embrace with Burr, until a quiet harrumph erupts beside us. "Llana, I need you to carry Terrakion's tail for me. It's dragging."

Prior, he didn't see such an importance in the stubby brown attachment and its granular items embedded inside. Admittedly, my auburn orbs scour the edges of the sandy limb in question and slip to a wider stance at sight of the ragged composure: half of it appears severed off, even, with a thin line—a scar?—cutting through fleshy bits at the tailbone. "Please do so soon, before it falls."

"Geez, Tim, you look like you'd sock me when I kiss her!"

"_Burr—" _The dark aura about him lashes like it grows sudden tentacles, ensnaring me colder and more enforcing than Burr's great warm arms, large and much kinder.

And he only laughs. "I'm kidding, man! I wouldn't kiss another lady! I got Mina for me. And that's all I need-a; just my Mina." Tim doesn't answer to that, only shakes his great, gray head in a slow, swishing manner. "I mean, I love Llana and all, but ew, ew, not romantically. That just might be a worse combination than me with Zoey—please, no. Just no. I can't even come up with something quick and sarky there. No says it all." Finally, as if feeling the brush of a cool air assuming stance, Burr releases me and steps back one time, another, one more. "Seriously, though, what's up?"

Though from my position I don't catch Tim's expression well enough, the sudden loss of strain in Vivi's pearl-like face drops a weight from my heart. My worries have left off. The timburr has shrugged, backed off from his rifled self; and the virizion explains through a calm, controlled tone: "We're headed off to Sunlit Dais, where Quagsire said we could drop off these troublesome ones."

"Sweet! I'm all for it!" And without a break in his stride, Burr takes a great leap and pounces toward the larger sized—and also larger tempered—one, taking up a right limb and slinging it over his shoulder like carrying a small sack of Llana or Zoey.

That's a nice part of Burr: one doesn't have to ask his permission: he's all for it. He's all for it, stuck with us, permanent like a real, bubbling river, filled with laughter as is runs through Paradise: us. And he is part of us. He truly is... just as much as Zoey, as me, as Vivi or Bay or Jen or... even Elijah. I'm altogether reassured his spirit rests with us... somewhere. The calm hold on my heart tells me so, how clasped it is within another... within Elijah...

Upon Burr's release of me, Tim turns his head so that the coal-dark orbs pierce me again. "The tail, please." I recall how he'd wished for me to pick up an extra bit of flesh that makes up Terrakion, one that didn't seem to concern him only a mere scattering sense of moments prior. Now, after Burr had so protectively weaved himself around me—I'd always seen the jolly, brown one as a fixture in my life, one that couldn't blow away, and not any romantic interest, as he'd told off himself; and yet that glance Tim seems to spread upon me, assuring—by any non- or violent means—I won't spend any time like _such _with _him_ seems to alleviate him.

Does he want something to... do with me? Betwixt a throbbing heart and soul, I may as well presume of such. His glancing rather unnerves me, although—perchance this... does mean more than what I could capture in my head in the cusp of our recollections.

Tim says I act weird as he does. He could refer to any effect through that cause. Of course, though, whatever meaning this does derail from, the first and foremost bit of foundation is that either way, whatever happened on the... grounds in the sky, I suppose... Lady Munaah—the Bittercold, the Hate in our situation—has lost life. I am the only one left: no matter what Ember and Cheeka assume; no matter how Tim glances back at me.

No matter what the meaning could trace to.

With an almost-violently singing Burr, hungry for more song and music in our group of conscious and unconscious entities, half regular—if I am regular—and half legend, goes on in tune, chasing rampant dreams from insane folks of a time long ago with dragons much more fiercer than Jen up in the sky having vines or sharper, even scythe-like appendages cutting their heads off and bleeding the world in red as the so-called red-dying hero hoists himself on someone or another through shoulders and cheers, cheers for victory and rejoice. I sing along; this is Burr and my friends, none other of disturbing whatnot. I can string a jolly tune here. Vivi's calmer whisper of a breeze, of a wind of a song, casts upon us in regular, though few, bouts, and I doubt Tim's low voice echoes within us at all, though one could be surprised.

His eyes, though: they stare on, unblinking and without emotion. On and on through the well-trodden path that goes _crunch, crunch _beneath us and streams out far ahead, below a bright-lit sky calling of morning. Further out, near those pesky Crags of Lament and their crumbly composure, lies past what must be the Sunlit Dais. On the map Victini—quite the fiery young lass now dedicating her immortal soul to searching out lost mortal souls in Mystery Dungeon and pinning their pleas of help on such map—she created, we found a bright, shining circle of light after the ground loses footing, to the bottom of craggy peaks.

There we shall find, circled perhaps ceremoniously with those numerous rings of shimmering, gray stones, the clearing of Sunlit Dais. From what I see, we'll have to climb further below ground until coming across whatever enchantment will hold Cobalion and his boulder-like minion.

Wherever the duo ends up, I get a frozen whiff in my heart that no one should trail into this dungeon. Not even the mate of our dear Vivi—he cannot even be put there. It would not help him, surely. But still, he is nowhere. A small piece of my heart shreds to pity for the cry of Kyo, for his lost soul that has been taken away.

Kyo has won Vivi's calm, gentle heart already. However he was then cannot change whoever he is now; the poor nature-wrung girl cannot lose sight of him. And it hurts to see them each struggle endlessly over their hearts and pains that make them and break them.

Song streams on, not even cut abrupt as we crawl through the main lines of mountains and rich, green roads to the cliff-lined approach leading further out to Sunlit Dais. Somewhere through this cloudy, shadowed, windy, scraggly land, there lies a section where sky splits and sunlight pours out like no other, taking in the ground as it never could prior.

Though Burr's voice begins to cave in, sending any song into a tizzy of horror and dark tales, where now the prince finds the princess already poisoned by the venomoth and slowly dying a gasping, retching death of putrid agony—until I beg of him to please carve out a happy ending in which it's revealed the prince held a pecha berry and saved her anyways, all done by a cracked squeak of Burr's singing—we soon find the sunlight again. He grumbles about being unable to sing much more sunny-day songs where the world is perfectly round and every life is a kiss of bliss.

I somehow carve into him another happy song and he grumbles to tune.

While traveling and crawling first through the glowing entrance, then under the disc of a beginning hallway into the ground through rows upon rows of odd runes and dark, only slightly-lit for a Sunlit Dais of caverns. We only remain connected by the lugs of burdens shared between us.

Burr seems to tire and run out of songs, so I quietly suggest he sing about us. About Paradise. Quickly the brown timburr leavens and flushes out a quick string of words:

_Elijah's aliiiive  
Look at the tiiime  
Kissin' ol' Llana some more  
_

_Back and forth  
Rising north  
With stars where the dead go lore  
Yay! _

I can't tell why, but Burr thus finds the song a great joy to repeatedly sing until Tim's claws begin to scrape across the walls, a voiceless request to end his little game.

_Ssssssssccccrrraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa_pe...

The slits in my ears twinge with pain, but the tone- and tune-deaf timburr doesn't seem to notice. Already he's ditched any sense of pure, golden voice and rambles on for a reason I can't quite plant a finger upon. He seems happy. I feel a warm glow continue to radiate in my heart. At least he's happy.

We have a limited amount of scandals with other pokemon, each of the dirt-colored beings seeming unimpressed and uncaring about what we do but still holding sharp tooth and claw. Taking a single look at me sometimes calms the character down, and we share a smile before they crawl back to their hidey-hole, though other times Tim momentarily wriggles free a claw and gives a careless stab into one's heart.

That works as well, though I like my solution more.

Our steep climb down, down the circular chambers eventually sends us to a pit, where the very room dips down together in one motion and forms a crumbly, sloping chamber where a supposed crack here and there suggests the very room will fall apart about us, taking in our souls and killing us all in one more motion. Only one more. I step back, heart aching at the thought. My head sweeps back and forth through the chamber, attempting to catch glimpse of where one could store a legendary in such confines.

"Hmm." Vivi's lips curve around her teeth, the white marbles jutting slightly out of her jaw. "Could Quagire have been wrong about this?"

Our heads swing like pendulums together, but no sound emanates a success. Even Burr's music has died short—that is, until I note that the warm, brown friend of mine has disappeared from sight.

"Where did Burr go off to?"

"Oh, gee..." Violet orbs snap beneath the weight of her brother, the solid gray still unmoving in a thick, blue set of wavy curls. "He's simply vanished. I... forgot to give attention to him and simply didn't notice when he let go... O-oh, Burr..." Her voice ends in an unruly squeak, but I only want to add to it.

Tim watches us through windowless eyes that don't collect any information. He hasn't corrected me on stumbling away from Terrakion's stubby tail, which again drags in the dirt.

Our breaths seem to tighten in a great throng of release when the stomping of Burr's clumsy toes and broken voice echo across hallways. He's okay. I suck out another breath, funneling out any fear. He's okay. Musky, earthen walls touch my nose, fill my breath with dirt and ground and soil. He's okay.

Eventually the feet stop, a soil-like shadow halting in front of the chamber. "Oh, hey, look, there's a little incision right here. Wonder what it does." Dark, warm orbs seek mine for permission to press the incision and warm, watery laughter escapes me.

Tim's eyes narrow. "Don't do anything. Let us escape first." A furry hand, cold and yet warm, inviting, jabs into mine and practically drags me away just as Terrakion's body hits the ground in an uproar of a _FUMP. _Cobalion soon joins his partner, Vivi wriggling past as well and pressing through our thong of a timburr pair and snivy, her own load singing a _FUMP_ as well.

"Hmm. Very musical." My poor, dear friend now opts for a raspy, almost skeletal tone. "I should use that on the return route."

"You need something to drink," Tim grumbles back.

"Press the button?" I squeak. "Um... please? Perchance it—"

_ZZZIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNGGGG!_

The room erupts into a smoking hazard of light, celestial screeches cutting through however I wanted to end the sentence. I never do finish those words, not not as my auburn orbs fill with it, the such bright, white, encompassing, sucking and stealing and void-like light: everywhere it goes and steals pupils and sucks in darkness and light, so bright, so very very bright. White and all over, bouncing along faces and everything and just so allowing feel in my hand so that I escape from Tim to an encore.

Eventually, such brightness adjusts to a debatable sense of insightful usage. "A-ah..."

Tim jabs into my hand again. "We should probably go soon."

"Ohh yeahhh, man... ooohh yeaaaahhh..." For a few jumbled moments, Burr has reduced himself to a babbling soul, but soon he sucks in his breath and steps back once, again, once more, and turns away, which I somehow catch from the corner of my blinded sight. Tim hauls me away as well and turns as I do. Vivi ends our little squadron, blinking repeatedly.

"There are times when I wish I was a bipedal pokemon with the ability to rub my own eyes.

"This happens to be one of those times."

Burr and I cannot stop an usurped giggle or so, but the stony-cold Tim beside me only shakes his head a short, shallow burst and starts on, away from the blinding chamber and whatever could be hidden behind curtains of light.

**Let's be honest. I had no idea what to do with Cobalion and Terrakion at first. I was just like (a few years ago) THEY'LL RUN AWAY.**

**But I mean this is Tim—you can't really run from him..? Question mark? Not exactly possible? So he's like hammer throw and now we have some locked legends in the pit of Sunlit Dais. Wonder if they're thinking about how tan they'll be once it's over.**

**Blacker than Tim.**

**Tim: -knows what he'll say will be contradicted on the spot- **


	6. Leaving Behind the Waste

Chapter 6: Leaving Behind the Waste

"_So," squeaks a voice in my head, quickly ensnaring me into whatever situation could be in front of us, to whatever I will be brought unto next: "it's been awhile."_

_For a moment, I lose sight of my words and feel language shuddering about me. I hadn't truly expected the royal-framed one to speak so simply. I expected a mission, a sort of duty, something fearful and painful, not... a kind greeting. But, truly, Lady Munaah has long passed away. Idle conversation can be resumed. "I don't see you enough, Stella."_

"_Then I'm afraid this'll be too short," she goes on, blatant with her word, and a fresh showering of titters follows. "I hate this. I hate this so much, honestly. Excuse my lack of royal tone, or whatever, but I want to crack little Truught in half._

_"It deserves much less than that, either way, for how it's treating a sacred one's Llana. Humph." The edges of her long, fluffy white tail frizz up like they do when she's nervous, or distraught or on the verge of boiling over: anger must seethe in her veins, pumping blood like magma. Stella's own angular white snout tinges pink. "I just can't believe it."_

"_...Stella?"_

_Believe what... exactly? Is the fluffy one overreacting or..._

_or..._

"_Aye, lassie, you don't know where to go on, do ye?"_

_What was that? My mind spikes in a flurry of sudden movement and colors swirl—dangerous partings of colors, and it seems the white of my dear Stella has washed itself out. The fluffy one loses grip and I surge my fingers forward but she won't grab them. She won't move. Won't look. Purple orbs—piercing. Won't... won't..._

"_We're fine, Father. Just dandy."_

"_Are ye now, girl?"  
_

"_St-ste—"_

_Warm, molten orbs pick me apart under my retrospective gaze, only tossing more disorienting colors and swirls into the distance, like throwing away polygons is natural in this world: though it very well could be, in a dream. "Ye must be Stella's... what was it?"_

"_She's Llana, Father," grumbles the whiter-furred daughter beside him. "My Llana."_

"_Aye, yer Llana." His accent—the royal one—it's much thicker swirling about his tongue. He knows its... lingo. How to strike a calm sense of superiority, one that none other seems able to top. And those molten orbs flicker about like flames, dancing over the areas surveyed about him, and I feel as if he is a... a ruler over it? If that even can be molded into a sort of word..._

_For what must be the first time in a large gap of space, I mumble a quick "hello."_

"_Hello, young lassie," he goes on. "Hello, hello." And the white one, such broader in most every aspect and even highlighted in streaming red clumps of fur, turns to his starlit-white daughter. To Stella... the white one who is... mine in a sense..? "And hello, Daughter."_

_She squeaks back in a harsh whisper. Nervous: in front of this important and pompous figure; in front of little me? A bubble nearly bursts in me—perchance of laughter. I seem unable to tell what, precisely. Whether or not this is a good thing, I don't know as well. Stella, be safe. Be safe. Judging by her slumped, white figure, she almost disperses into a blinding gap of light, none else. Pure manifestation._

"_Father, what are you doing here?"_

"_I thought of finally meeting this character you've been using such an allot of time with. Quite the given to spend tramping around with her and that old, scaled bore as well?"_

"_A-ah..! Gerald wasn't a bore." Sparks of energy meld Stella's basic quadrupedal form into view again, molding her together as if she's a hunk of colorless clay, save the purple dots of eyes. "I quite appreciate where I left myself. Had I not, perchance I would have came home sooner." And I recall, from her flustered batterings of words, running haphazardly over sore spots of memories, the elder grass reptile, my uncle, now dead: Gerald. Dead like any heritage I had; dead like a lot of things. _

_I soon note the cold, stony silence between father and daughter and me. "Stella..?"_

_Violet orbs trace over me tirelessly, spiraling about my little lithe figure over and over in baby squiggles as she sighs in her royal tone. A slow drop in voice follows. "I hate it, Father."_

"_I hate it as well, my daughter," recites the much-more kingly one in response, his words waddling behind like children to Stella's great thought. That she hates it. Hates what? Hates me? Hates Paradise? Hates Zoey?_

_No, no. Those lucid orbs pierce me to a dark pit, buried beneath the nadir inside of me. Something colder, something much more painful through the rasping squeak of Stella's tired, old breath than simple quittance, just a release of pent-up hate broiling like a pot through thick, white layers of furs. "Stella... what is wrong?" My own whisper is weak, a trail lost in the air of mist, unable to bridge the gap between Stella and me. "Stella... Stella, please... what ails you, Stella? Why do you look at me so horridly? What could possibly harm you? You're my Stella—you're so majestic, so strong, so all-encompassing."_

_A drawl escapes, dull and lifeless: "You can't die when that scum lives on, Llana..." Desperation shocks her into submission, into pain, into a frigid breath pooling out and chilled with fear._

"_As long as the scum lives, so can you! I don't want you to die! And I don't want the scum to live!" The scum. The scum. Thescum. "Shall they die and make you die and take you away..."_

_Seeing the flash of emotion plain across her canvas-esque face, her father steps up. Winds whip up like fierce tentacles and cut across my vision of the fluffy ones—of father and daughter. "Young Llana, please do not lose that little Hope of yours. I'd be quite... heartbroken to see my daughter in this sort of delirium over you. Please do ordain to life."_

_And with a grin twirling over limp cheeks, strung together by none but torn-down furs the color of dying flames alone, that king of my dear Stella winks from my sight._

_And so does she: so does my dear Stella._

A muffled squeak like a bump in the middle of the night bolts morning open. As my eyes adjust to the regular dimness of a foggy morning—revealed by the puffy beasts grazing upon the grasses outdoors and smearing every surface nearby with a round of dewdrops—I also adjust to that fact of how this is not midnight: thank goodness I haven't woken in the midst of darkness. Those whispers beneath the black sky cause thin layers of fear to cast over me.

Perchance I would feel better off, higher pitched on the morrow had a certain cheery blob of constantly-water-dripping joy showed. From what I've heard—and that alone lies scarce—Zoey departed for a faraway Mystery Dungeon, tackling an inscrutable request for she and the small, cyan dragonet Jen alone.

Bless their childish souls. Shall they not return... safe...

No. They have to. Nothing lies in wait for the naïve oshawott; she could sock what she felt necessary in unthinkable spots, should her energy prove too high. And even without the extra sugars, my young friend knows how to hold her own. She also boasts of a lithe bagon following along her tail, the duo claiming themselves unstoppable.

Had I heard of this deliberation prior to my entangling affairs with Vivi and her family reunion, I noticeably doubt any aching want, any sort of light hope in my bones carried along for the ride—nothing seems to shine when I hear about her choice.

I don't want her—I don't want anyone—to magically dissolve into thin air and never be seen again. When one has felt, has watched such a scene play before them, things change. And the pulsating blob of a squeeze in my heart tells me that the oshawott should not choose such a path. It's all I can think of as my brain swirls about in a tizzy, just how much I declare unable to let go.

It's impossible to let go; I refuse to let go. Fists form from each side like hard, lumpy reminders of what waits for my feeble loss of strength, of will, of ability to hold on any longer. But... a lofty but lodges inside of me, wriggling out through gaps in my fingers: I can trust them. I should be able to trust these teammates to live through the Mystery Dungeon on their own, as their own: live. I can trust Zoey, and I can trust Jen, to do whatever they can to stop death, shall its ugly head be reared. And that is what we account for her: that death shall not rear any flash of disturbance to us.

My heart thumps pitifully as I gulp down small portions of breath.

They know how to live. They know how to blot out pain. They know how to keep up a living streak. I shake my head once and once more, and I know they can live. It's just... hard to accept givens when those givens are taken in the worst moments, allowing pleasant memories and wonderful entities to be erased from lifelines; it's hard to lean back on givens that disperse from time to time, as live goes.

The fog doesn't give off a shadow, and yet I feel as if its misty, multifarious orbs track me as I move throughout the wooden chamber on creaking bones and a thumping heart. The soft whiff of wet bark smooths me down in the slightest, but of course it's not enough—is anything enough? I move slowly, carefully, tracing scaled fingertips over the lifeless interior. Something to distract me, perchance? To keep my mind off of the adventuring oshawott and bagon, farther away from home than what a usual stroll should be?

It's okay... it's okay...

For the first time since I've woken, I begin to notice the considerably dry and warm atmosphere in our home's main chamber, alongside the slightly-glowing creature ensconced in Zoey's usual bed pile. She buzzes a soft snore, tittering with each breath while her straight red ears, looking fuzzy or hard to glimpse by their unmatched softness, flicker like flames. She releases a pent-up snore, rocking her pale head in place on the ground with a _tick, tick, tick, tick: _only a slight rhythm, somehow stuck in one motion.

Victini.

I never thought where the legend goes for rest after her endless roaming to each and every Mystery Dungeon nearby and far back, sticking each help plea or challenge or outlaw in the back of her head until returning to that map hanging in the midst of Paradise and placing needles on the magical homes where our visit is required. The velvety-red-and-cream creature, only just larger than me—without counting her ears—deserves undisturbed rest like so at times. Why she slumbers in the wettest and messiest pile of bedding, I cannot tell.

A sharper _snoooree._

Her breath hitches.

She coughs, spits something green into Zoey's hay.

"Gaawwwsh, what a sleeeeeepp... Nnnggggsss...ssss..." She nearly tosses into sleepy delirium but catches the presence—how, I don't know—of a wakened Llana up and walking. "Hmmmm? Lllaaaaaannaaaaaaaaaaaaa? Heeeyyaaaaaaaaaammmm...mmmnnng..." Another green globule finds home in my best friend's resting spot.

"Mmmngngngnngnnssss."

It seems I have no such choice. "Victini?"

"MMNNG."

"Could you stop spitting in Zoey's—"

"Nope. Not gonna happen." To prove her point, the cocky cream-colored legend screws up her cloud-colored lips and spouts another bit of what must be snot. "By the way, who's this, like, Victini girl again?"

Did she... forget her name? No... I doubt a being acting this crudely would forget herself and continue to act on these terms. This is still Victini. "Is that not you?"

"Nope. I've, like, changed my name."

"You—what?"

"Yeah, like Vivi. Because she makes, like, good points."

Because she makes good points. Her collectivism surprises me with the dullness of vocabulary—or diction. Her explanation could use work as well. Though I do admit, Victini—or whatever her name is now—has only just woken up. "So what is your name now? I would like to call you by your pref—"

"No idea."

"No idea?" My slightly-royal tone squeaks back in surprise. She doesn't know her own name? Did the velvety one forget? Did she accidentally burn her brains to a crisp... or should the victini only play with me again as she would her food?

"Yep. No idea. I've changed it, just, like, no way, like no how, like know what." The childish female accent threads along the room, through my ears, painfully grinding as it goes.

"Uh..." How should one respond when they've been told by someone they don't know what to name themselves? "Good luck?"

A snort. More snot dribbles into Zoey's still-damp hay, green splotches in fuzz. My stomach curdles over. "Ya gotta help me."

"I know less than you do about it. I don't know you."

Another snort. "Yeah, but you're, like, Llana. Gawwsshhh, girrrrllll, you gawt dis." Like a drunk she rises from bedding not even her own, listlessly flicking stray hay from her fluffy bounds of fur over clouded, blue eyes that take up great lengths of her face. "Ya got that royal accent er whatever." A fire lights in her eyes. "Yeah. That. Now amaze me and I'll stop pestering you."

Now I've been endowed by the responsibility of naming a legend who will surely fry me via those vibrant red fingernails shall I disappoint. And I've never quite seen Victini satisfied. She insults her own handiwork done by the painting of the map and any holes punctured into the bark by accidental pine needles. Yes: she even discredits herself.

I swallow horridly. A lump seems to have salivated in my throat—without my approval or wanting. Attempting to unclog thus windpipe, a piece droops down the slimy tubes inside of me with a few hollow _squiirrchhes, _slowly, uncomfortably followed by more miniature blobs. I wish I could stop myself from speaking; the look alone burning in formerly-Victini's gaze suggests I will be blackened by flame anyways.

But what do I tell her? "Fire?"

"Fiyah." That ridiculous accent bursts out in an always-mocking tone. I expect a real insult on the way, in the waiting room on the tip of her tongue, but suddenly the victini's face brightens, as if I'd created a glamorous, passionate, burning name all in one go and this was it. "Haaaaaaaa-haah! You a hoot!" So she finds me funny. "Hmm. Maybe though... like, I go by F. F is fierce. F is flame. F is..."

A dangerous light dances in those big, innocent, pond-like orbs. "Fiiiyah."

I blink dumbly. "So I call you F now?" Seeing her response has dislodged the worrisome ball of saliva in my mouth, but my voice feels waterlogged anyway. Though looking at this fire legend renews a piece of myself grateful for the cool taste inside of me.

"Hmm... hm-hm-hm-hm-hmmmm... Yes. Ya, like, call me F."

"I call you F."

"Ya call me F. An' if I get any better ideas, I'm changin' it. No hard feelings, though, like totally none." Batting eyelashes at me, F the victini—odd as it sounds, as it tastes in my mouth—flops down on a bed, this one my own, and puckers her lips; the cream cheeks quickly lose such vim. "Nah. Ya kinda helped me. I prolly won't."

Rancid, green globules vanish from my future visions of the room like F had hidden Zoey in our home and just used her as a sponge. I can only hope now that she'll clean up her rented bedding while she's on such a roll. Though I know better than to believe she'll live up so high. This already—a feeble promise to not shoot excessive spitballs—exceeds expectations.

But what will I do, standing here as F curls into a fiery ball and her head _tick, tick, ticks _toward slumber once more? I feel a wriggle in my mind, a small and blunt reminder that Zoey is still out there, but my finished conversation with the glowing bunker in my bedding has rekindled the slightest bit of trust. They can live.

A rampant thought collides: I never truly had asked Quagsire—however recent our trip to Sunlit Dais was, of Vivi and Tim and Burr and me—what would be of Cobalion and his boulder-like lackey, Terrakion, after the light consumed. Did he know this, or did he stumble upon it... or was he lying or..?

Soon these ideas, any that could be dead-on right or wrong, hit-or-miss situations alongside the this-may-be-aside-us resolutions, eat at my mind and consume most thoughts in their path. With a hasty good-bye to a snoring F by the encore, I duck out of the creaking oak door of misty brown and spill into Paradise and its deep, foggy morning. The landscape about me doesn't disperse in the cool shrouding about me: hills peak out of their usual grassy slopes, and the earth continues to sing with the colorful volumes of flowers and clovers and all kinds of grassy proprietors, innumerable owners to the ground they live in, and their lives from the ground.

Though fog, like transparent icing, coats these nature companions, I still vaguely can see where the map is—hanging slightly behind my stroll—or the forest further offhand, or even the hillock-like home I'm leaving as I set off ahead for the exit of Paradise; for the start of tiny, quiet Post Town.

Why a village like theirs has stopped its continuous banter—upon matters I'd rather refrain from thinking or gossiping over, much less gossip—should surely be worrisome. I've never found the wooden homes encircling gently to one side and falling back where Mary's Inn, or Quagsire's unmentioned other home, as for all of us it seems, to be this still, as if ghosts wander where lives once did.

I want to know why. We each do. It wavers, an unspoken plea between my teammates and I whenever we go through here together. To wander the landscape alone only shivers down my spine, fogs gently pilfering the empty homes and giving the place where numerous lives gathered and shared their times together a further empty feel. I'm... alone.

The silent whisper stabs through my heart as I break for a dash into the single building with a warm glow budding through windows, through cracks in doors, through balconies and every crevice able to spare the joy on the inside.

In fact, once the large, tinted-brown doors quietly lean in for my final push through, I poke my head in and there's nary a soul loitering in the belly of the kindest home I've ever been to. Those few who do show turn to face me, and I see—or I feel, not quite sure which emotion displays what goes on in my heart—this glow leap onto their expressions and flatten out wrinkles, smooth bent scales.

Sometimes my identity unnerves me—just the slightest; but remembrance of my opposite, of her desperation pooling out and lashing unto others stifles my fears. Lady Munaah... was my antonym, and now the light on these pokemons' faces can be held on for eternity. I struggle to believe this as the weight of my prior dream, condensed with the fog, flits in my eyes: Stella howling over a death—mine—and how... in pain she would be; her father watching over my figure with kind yet worried eyes; scum and scum and scum again.

I fall out of my rhythm and let myself kneel on the ground, stubby legs bending—more collapsing—beneath me. Falling on my own, I lower my pale green scaled fingers to the wooden paneling as well and touch the surfaces, feeling a connect arc between me. I don't want to be alone. I don't want to be alone like Lady Munaah, or like the fear rolled up in Stella's flashing violet orbs. Eyes piled tight shut, I decide this firmly, not as a fear but as a foundation:

loneliness will hurt me, as it did to the pastel-colored psychic before she died of it. Not like a fear but like forgetting to breathe or blink—not unconsciously: completely. Like death itself thrusting into my chest and barreling me over.

"Llana!"

What I assumed to be a whiff of cooked foods under a kindling—a special perfume of Mary's—turns around and curdles in my stomach like charred flames. For one precious moment, I lose sight of what I smell or taste in my mouth, charred or burned or medium-rare, for all I can tell: auburn locks with dull pink as I look up.

"Ember..?"

The simian fire creature doesn't respond to hearing his name. A quick swerve confirms that the water partner of his hasn't shown. Cheeka is nowhere to be found. Somehow the small, pale, fiery mammal catches glimpse with me again and mutters through a corner in his mouth, "She hasn't been feeling well of recent," in his smoky whisper, cold but lively.

"A-ah... Ember..." My eyes screw tight shut on their own as a fire-warmed hand lands on one of my leaf-yellow shoulders. To steady me or him, I can't tell, but soon after he falls to my slump and giggles, just softly.

"She cried the same when we thought you were to die."

That day... He and Tim each share that uncaring trait to mention the unmentionables that occurred upon our group of Paradise. They just shrug off any gruesome details and chat through the bloodshed.

I know the red-furred psychic has a heart, but mine cannot stand such purgatory. It hurts to think about Lady Munaah: her desperation, her own pain, her loneliness, the rows and rows of carcasses she caused, the loss of Elijah's life, the castle in the sky she called her home, controlled by that insane-turned ice legend, Kyurem, where she painted life red, where she painted me red, and a red that cannot be washed off by any means ever again.

It simply hurts. A great throbbing thud in my heart, a fist pounding in each memory, bites me back.

Whether or not the pansear is aware of this, he merely sits there beside me until he asks, "It was her brother that made her want to get a name?"

Vivi. Cobalion. "Yes, it was." Perchance Ember knows what the zing of light held? He's proven multiple times by affiliation to not only Stella, the queer fluffy one, but also he and Cheeka do happen to be psychic mutations from a time ago when other creatures would seek power.

Power: so tantalizing; so controlling; too much. It's too much.

"We had to... place he and his lackey in a strange Mystery Dungeon's floor and... watch them be sucked into unending light."

Our eyes take their time opening and catching upon one another again. I notice with a gap of breath how... protective, how brotherly, of a form Ember holds. Though his height doesn't even beat Zoey's—who has been taking growth spurts as of recent; she's growing—he protects those about him, without the others realizing. I see now, so close to the fire-breather's face, how his eyes skirt about the room and silently connect, silently check in with each character present in the inn. He doesn't want to hurt most innocents, I reminisce, but will do what he can for a greater good.

Except Cheeka. The simian water creature is in his possession, in his protection, for as long as he can leave it. Forever, as it can. I do now recall how a young Ember had to free a younger Cheeka from the rubble created by what those power-hungry creatures did to them, and how her egg hatched and psychic energy obliterated. And now he has grown extremely attached to the weaker, much more powerful psychic mutation.

"The light," he finally muses, "was I believe a sort of energy either produced by the Dungeon or possibly what lies above... Whatever hell of an arceus we have." I know the pansear rarely curses, but the word stings in my mind. He doesn't have a reason to trust this celestial ruler; he has enough pain to loathe, I know. "But it's dangerous. Your team did... well, to know where the fob was and to duck from the final chamber."

And again, his words linger, thankfully without a sharp retort. "Celestial..."

A nod. "Yes. Celestial," goes the rumbling murmur. "Special like... that."

The conversation lies untouched for a single moment, until one or the other of us picks with the words until they form sentences, and soon a string of persiflage floats about us, the shorter creatures sitting on their knees on the paneling, talking about nothing so useful but just listening to voices bat betwixt one another. The faint light in his dull, pink orbs seems to move in him, first in one eye, then twinkling in the other. A sudden surge in my heart spills a plea out, that Cheeka, however sick she is and however long her psychic abilities harm her, that she not sink into suffering, into desperation, and that if the heart hooked to her tries to fall I will do whatever is vested in my piteous chest to save her as much as Ember can, or above and beyond: whatever I can.

There are too many blessed souls in this world to lose any.

**Me: Hmm. Interesting. I see that I have been writing these chapters a little bigger now. Wonder how much bigger they'll get.**

**Ember: Why do you care about length?**

**Me: Curious. Usually these chapters are kinda short but I'm curious what'll happen.**

**Ember: Curiosity killed the espurr.**

**Espa: ewell You did not say my name.**

**Ember: -_-ll**


	7. Filthy Scum

Chapter 7: Filthy Scum

The thoughts lodge in my throat, and their entrails dangle in my mind, snapping at whatever globule currently holds their interest. I can hardly seem to attract attention anywhere but on the wide-smiled expression of a white-faced, ocean-furred mammal continuing to blink from existence in my eyes. I still haven't seen her. I want to see her. Zoey's smile is so bright, like a star, a dancing role model in the sky for me to follow behind with a flood destroying any fear weaved into a dam to block from my heart.

And now that little flood has petered out, wavering right before my eyes. I know I should believe in safety, that she and Jen will each return with a great smile on their faces and apologies twisting up their lips; when all I want to do is pump adrenaline-pinched legs and sprint into Zoey's eyes and scream at her to come back and she will. The wild unknowing out there—not knowing where she is—not knowing where Jen is—not knowing where anyone is, when the time comes—chews accordingly to craft holes in my skin.

Will the happy-go-lucky child show herself soon?

Will the happy-go-lucky child ever show herself again?

Can she? Is this even a possibility for Zoey's current state? Or is she... is she...

Hair-like tendrils boil in my throat, sizzling into woven lines of fear, fear, fear; what if, what if, what if: a deadly game played now inside of me. And I shake myself to an encore of shivers, pale green and yellow and scrumptiously pale scales reflecting the emotions bounding inside of me like children playing one of their games—a gentle game that doesn't involve running into a Mystery Dungeon and losing that ability, that ability to run back, on one's way.

A whisper shatters the illusion of a tiny oshawott and a tiny bagon: blue bodies huddled against very red flames that engulf their entire existences: "Look at her. You call her so special, and this is special? This?"

"Tim. She's worried. This is how she works—she hates losing life or joy. It's her part to care. This is her purpose, and this is her fear."

A scoff, like rocks tossed against boulders, clatters in my thin ear slits. "You're hurting her, all of you, with these feelings put on her back."

"What are you even talking about?"

No answer.

Dark eyes flash vibrantly—a warning. Thick and hard in my throat, the hairs coalescing together and I choke on thick and hard tendrils. "Don't push her." Another warning.

"Tim, you sound on the edge of lunacy. Please pace yourself." Still I can't place whoever is conversing, railing at, the shadowy one I think lies like a murky bodyguard in front of me. He doesn't want to move, surely. With a hazy glimpse between hazier auburn orbs, I still cannot read it. "Pace yourself, dear boy, especially if you want to try as hard as please her like Elijah once did."

My body goes raw. Frozen. Don't mention that name. Don't mention the past. The past with ice castles and blood and his dead body flung like a toy across a field with children. Children that kill each other because of marble-like desperation in their deep, sad eyes.

"You're unnerving her with that talk, Mary."

A gleam. "Who said you weren't? You act like it's such a secret, but truly: did you expect Quagsire and myself not to notice?"

Another gleam, this from the shadow. My head throbs, a knot in my skull, tearing out of my scales and into the outside world, where skeins interact and entangle without.

"Fair enough."

"Indubitably; quite fair." A sky blue bill, twisted in what could be a grin. "Quite fair; quite fair."

And like a pack of migrating pebbles, the scoff hits hard. "Fair." The word releases like old garbage. And I lose thought to the swirling pattern of seawater-smelling water mammals—Zoey—as the world spins in and out of orbit, and beckons me closer yet again. To where? To where? What closer?

"I told, and I'm telling you, you to be careful."

"_Fair. Enough._" Again dark, again roiling hotly beneath the skin, releasing pent-up steam and a wild, wild anger. A hand—stinging—slaps over mine and whiffs me off.

Or maybe I'm not moving and I only feel woozy, toppling into a vortex labeled heartache: for Zoey, for Jen, for Elijah. Don't die, don't die, and he died. He died. He just died, left on, leaving behind a bleeding corpse stained by red behind, all I could ever see of him again.

But the whistle of only gently-used air about me ensues, and so does the ripping sensation just beneath my rump, so I assume only the predictable: that I am being dragged, in fact. Not that I honestly mind, or could mind, with my own mind in such an addled state as it is. The dragging goes on underneath my slightly-miffed behind and tail, its pale curls possibly dusted with grit as of now. I don't know where I'm going; nor do I care.

I continue along the bumbling trail without question, only silence in await of whatever lies before me until the unruly _FUMP _tosses balled-up snivy into forest flooring on a russet leaf-bed followed by flurries of _crunch, crunch, crunchcrunchcrunchcrunchcrunch. _Hues of green wrap around my head in sickening orbits until flinging themselves aside and specks of light bend past the great shadow looming overhead. A whisper traces down my cheek, but the words smudge and I can't seem to pick up pronunciation other than the warm breath trickling into my ear.

Words don't match but crumble apart; berry orchards without a due time of water crack and produce fringes like this. The brown fuzz only reveals loss, as do my attempts at hearing and understanding.

Perchance he notices my discomfort, my inability to communicate, much less engage myself. Perchance not. I may be useless here anyways. But a word still draws across my mind like a clean painting now drawn in half by a thick, red line, a line no one can easily erase: "Llana."

My name. So black and filthy and dark and in such a deep, demanding tone that saunters about like a champion, a king, a leader.

"You're unwell."

If nothing else, one single phrase socks me. "I'm fine."

"You can't possibly always be fine," comes the snappy response. My stomach crawls: anger pokes and prods and molds into Tim's figure, his voice, the trees and backdrops hanging behind him, in front of him, below and above him, all circling in silly, fluttering ringlets. Without any intention of what to do, I sneeze. The black, near-bottomless holes of eyes trail me and start with my squeak. "You can't possibly always be fine." A fluffy, black hand presences itself on my forehead, encompassing what little face I have.

He surely feels my cold, quick breaths on him.

I feel his warm, deep breaths on me. Those black holes cut down my scales using only that simple stare. Unlike the air about me, it's cold: alluring and yet painful, like an icy stab down my back. "Let me protect you."

Whether or not he likes my stiffened response, Tim doesn't speak again.

_Let  
me  
pro  
__tect  
you._

Like losing marbles, I can't find what to say. How does one respond when this creature comes up to them—one they've been forced under peculiar interest to be closer toward after reins of fear against him—and acts as such? Protect me—_protect me? _

What could he even mean by that? The bones in my throat clamp tight because I don't know, and the words continue to slip away like fleeting glimpses of Zoey in the back of my head: half told here she is, here she is, while deep on the inside I know very well the oshawott has continued to remain unseen.

A rip, a black-and-white memory sliced apart by blood: the moment the characters of Paradise hadn't seen Zoey and myself for a time much longer and didn't fret, not so much, not even when other matters turned them over, like stones, one after the other: insane.

And none of us knew whether Tim truly didn't realize his true intentions or... he was aware. And now that black-clawed creature with blood-stained bits of weaponry—fangs, another assorted sharp object bodily attached—stands above me and asked first for my forgiveness, now for my allowing of him to protect me.

To—to save me from what? Himself? Although the thought reassures me, I doubt someone protecting another doesn't intend to lock themselves away in order to help the one in custody. And yet, heart pinched up tight to my chest, squirming fitfully, I don't.

I don't know what to say. His hand, still and tight over my head, doesn't stray, and neither do the dark orbs pinning me down.

"What do you want me to say?" I squeak.

"Nothing, really," murmurs that deep, cold, dark tone back. My eyes slip back under him, but the pupils align in his grasp. Tim's grasp. A grasp I've never thought of clashing upon prior.

He chortles. "Nothing at all."

"Nothing at all?" I repeat it back like a bumbling fool.

"Nothing at all." The cut of a smile faces me instead. Chords pull in every which way: I still can't wrap the topic into any sort of point. What do I think? What do I presume? What am I supposed to think?

Anything? Nothing?

My eyes burn back at his. "Why? Why do you say and act so strangely, and then put it out on me and expect me to follow your lead? And live it down? And go along and..."

"...you're weird.

"I'm weird."

"Are you so?" I mumble back.

And Tim goes on: "I believe yes." His eyes flash vibrant black: dangerous black. My heart sinks. "I know where they are. They haven't shown because they get in the way."

It's a habit of the dark mammal, to piece words together and wriggle secrets in front of me, wait expectantly to ask nicely like a good little girl to be lead on: a child. I feel like a child. "They get in the way."

"Yes, they do."

In a sense, I could stop and ignore him alongside all else in this oddly silent encampment—highly suggesting I'm not close enough to my teammates for any signs of struggle to show—but I also happen to be aware of how unpredictable the shadow-like male can perceive as.

We still aren't wholeheartedly sure whether the timburr was insane like the others at the time he cut through said others so freely.

Tim could be against them. Tim could be against us. But somehow I'm sure, in a tiny, stuffed bit of my heart, he's not against me: somehow.

Those black eyes trace me about, and yet my heart doesn't spike out or scream itself in need. I'm not... afraid.

Confused. Bewildered. Befuddled. Unable to tell why I could be lying here with the black-furred one above me. I don't know, is what. A new grin cracks over his face as Tim murmurs, "We're both weird."

"Both..."

He says it like...

like...

My heart flips and shatters against the edges of my chest. Because she's dead; because Elijah's gone for that death; because it's impossible; because the shadows scare me; because even the smallest fragment of ignorance was bliss. Sweet, pure bliss. "Both." I say it stronger. "Both of us are weird."

I seem to be catching onto something, because a sudden light funnels out of Tim's orbs, rather like the rare one I had spotted prior. How... happy... does this make him? "Right here, no one is between us." He states it statistically, like a fact. I long for Espa or Umbre, one of the factoid-muttering eevee evolutions usually hot on my trail: Espa like a mother, Umbre the confused other trailing behind who he always wants or possibly needs to trail. But they care: they both care; about us, about me.

Still, the warm breath shakes by my side, whispers down my pointed face and scales: "She wasn't different." I translate. She. Lady Munaah. Different. The Bittercold. The Hate. Those factors Ember and Cheeka fear to see darken the horizon again. But did they ever darken the horizon prior—the thought of Munaah's desperate efforts, her... annihilation of Elijah, the name alone choking me up because the cheeky one was so encouraging and silly and naïve and... dead.

And that was the worst.

The storm has softened, the blows have stifled. Because it's over. It happened. The stare grinds against me, but he... Again, I shove his carelessly-tossed accusations under my skin, tucked out of mind: Tim plays this role enough times to say he couldn't possibly mean anything.

"I hurt your friend because she was in the way. She always was." Black slits narrow into blacker, narrower lines like wounds slicing through thick, matted fur. "And now she's not."

"Zoey."

"Zoey," he muses in return, "Zoey."

"Zoey!" My breath cuts shorter; the warmth flickering on my scales drops in temperature and the slits blur, nearly sliding out of view. Any leaves and vegetation in the background behind Tim's large, hulking figure slip away as well: unimportant and now ignored. Wind picks up; dangerous aura encircles me, an aureole trapping us in the midst.

Tim merely nods in return: methodically. I've accepted a sliver of the hot words pelted at me. "Yes. Zoey. She was in the way."

Something snaps inside of me; the cold emotion spills inside of me, freezing up my joints, shivering with me, even as Tim's breath and his fluffy fur surrounding me continues to hold warmth, because I can't feel it, because he's hurt her and Jen. I lose feeling. Words fall and spit. Out of me. At him at him at him Zoey Zoey Zoey Jen Jen Jen—please.

Help me.  
Help me.  
Help me.

His deep, dark, lubricious tone strikes through my cries: "You react painfully when I do this."

A gasp. My squeaks halt. We each speak the word.

"Elijah.

"Yes," I wheeze, "yes. Elijah. It hurts when even a single life slips away. And I love them. I love Zoey I love Jen I love Elijah."

Surprise. He flinches back in dark, shadowy motions. "Jen? I didn't see her." He didn't... he... "You're in pain."

"Why do you always do that?" I gain full power over my voice; I gain full power over my own stance, my movements, and pull myself over crunching grasses and dead leaves to stare up at the tall, leviathan one only swooning with the shadows about him that flicker and laugh at the sight of me. And I stand back at him. "You just... announce what you see and you bring up what I don't want to remember and you're rubbing salt into our shared wounds."

His eyes light again—not even feverishly; knowingly, an understanding passed betwixt us—at _shared wounds. _"Yes. I do."

"You do."

"Yes." The dark orbs suddenly light up, like there are windows of soul trapped inside: like Tim isn't a surreal shadow sucking up the light in my vision and woozily spinning through my mind. Wind whistles once more, but the fear has crumbled away in its purpose; simple warmth trickles past. "I like to remember what we did. I like knowing these are real creatures." He sees my jolt in response.

"Elijah."

"I started the wounds, although. Because he was in the way." Thoughts link like hazy wires, ones I hadn't seen prior but hold together sharply, threaten my passage into what would be cuts and bleeding.

"Zoey. Zoey was in the way."

A smile flickers back. "Zoey was in the way."

"Would she still be in the way"—his eyes hold fast at me—"if we saved her?" My light, tranquil tone moves like liquid through him. The orbs, swaying the slightest, seem to laugh back.

"Could she be in the way? She was. She could easily block my grasp at you again."

A-ah... But that only proves the cold numbness in my bones: Tim wouldn't dare harm me. At least now. In this moment. "But I love her, and you hurt me when you hurt her." I swallow back tears, icy remains melting into slush in my stomach, threatening to pool out my eyes. "Do you like hurting me?"

"I don't find it in my best interest to."

"Please. Help me." A whisper in high pitch. A lonesome plea.

Tim steps closer in his big, black feet through delicate bounds: one foot; the other; one; the other, until the body has pressed itself against me and he's whispering in my ear: "If she doesn't get in my way."

"Your way," I squeak.

"Yes. It's not in my interest to hurt you; it's not in my interest to hurt her. But she can't block you from me. I won't let her."

"No," my hollow response comes, "you won't." And he won't, come battering layers of recollection and blood and bone and tear and an emolga—a winged mammal the bright color of he sun, even through his big, black eyes—painted red and his limp body is _dead, _dead because Tim found him in the way from us.

Us.

I want to cry but the knot doesn't surface, and neither do the tears.

Us.

Usususususususus.

"Shall we find her, then?" A fluffy, dark hand lingers by my one side, and my heart jitters by my other but I know there's nothing else but to take the warm fingers and weave them through my own. A word thuds in the back of my head like footsteps, only crawling closer:

_elijah_

_Elijah_

_ELIJAH_

**Aaaahhh... that was fun to write. I love Tim.**

**Tim: I digress.**

**Me: But still. You're dark and foreboding and your fur is awesome and your personality is great. **

**Tim: Please stop complimenting me.**

**Me: whut**

**Tim: -eyes narrow- It's embarrassing. **

**Me: pfft. I love Tim. **


	8. Who Goes Around

Chapter 8: Who Goes Around...

"So I'm the Bittercold." With a heavy saunter and breath to match, Tim's leaping bounds pull me alongside easily. His glossy orbs continue to wash over me, like I'll trip and fall—though with my height, I could possibly disappear from sight quite easily. And the thought, each time, jolts me with that look: he wants to protect me. Shadowy fur clumps over my tiny fingers, and I think about the way it cloaks my hand—even despite its already small size, he seems to swamp me.

Does dark swamp light?

Why am I thinking about him being such a creature when—when—Elijah: Elijah died because of the Bittercold—not a nuisance of Lady Munaah: the Bittercold. Not Tim, but yes, the puny-named Lady Munaah, because she was the Bittercold, she was the ice-crafted monster drilled to my opposite: not this somewhat subdued timburr. It doesn't matter how he looks at me or what he calls out; Tim is Tim and that is all he'll ever be.

Eyes narrow. "Stop that."

"Tim..?"

"I can see it. Your denial. It leaks to an astounding overflow." Even the dark demeanor covers over my little delicate speak of his name. His hair shadows dangerously over his eyes in that odd curl overflowing his head. "Accept it. You take too long." The knots in my throat clump together, but I shake my head anyways, as if the simple movement can free me of the weight on my shoulders—of the weight staring directly at me, almost as if deciding how much of a threat I could be.

We go on, more so Tim's muscles plowing him and myself through as I cling tightly to his arm. All that flows in my mind is the need to find her and to stop whatever this creature's done to her. Again my brain jolts in place at the mention of it: what he's done to her, only peeling back layers that suggest and toss suspicion in my face for thoughts that don't add up and don't make anything but senseless nothingness.

He doesn't even pant at his breakneck pace, not even as stray bits of foliage whack him casually in the face; I can't even see the damage marked due to his silky night fur. Tim's health can shine spectacular like the midnight sky above us; I can't believe him.

"Why do you deny it?"

Memories spray like blood; thoughts flog like whips; fears cry like orphans and tie another knot in my throat, like a line of pain in scraggly form hobbling with the strength of an elder down my scaled body. Random pinches throb.

"Why, Llana?

"Why?"

Bombshells stuffed to the painfully full brim with melancholy throb as I set into a numb tizzy and an unpredictable ensemble of thoughts tear past, their own sort of tooth and claw established: of wide red eyes and the bodies of friends tattered and broken, insane and screeching and bleeding profusely, the stench of death hanging like a corpse floats in the air; Elijah's smaller body and cheekier smile poking from the pain and blooming only to be plucked like a stray flower and morphed into the backside of a pink hide, of a munna, of Lady Munaah, of desperate cries from someone who didn't do anything; and a shadowy figure hovering and sticking out fingers and laughing.

Laughing: a hollow, piercing sort of bellow that rolls more than floats out of the depths of my soul and fiercely rampages through ear drums and eyes and cold, stiff muscles torn apart by the laugh.

Does this, perchance, make my pain joyous? The shadowy character leaps into the creature clasping onto my tiny, green hand as glistening, coal-colored orbs follow me, wavering, like he's concerned. About me or maybe about himself, I can't tell or seem able to care. My ears throb blatantly, and trees whish, but the whishes don't trickle through sound. I don't hear the _whurrrrsshhhhh _as much as I feel tangles of gales pacing about me, piecing my lithe little body apart.

"You're shivering quite horridly." He's bypassed the last question. A cool breath of freedom touches me.

"I'm fine," comes the clean-cut response as it always does. A simple escape from a true answer, hollowed out by emotion or blatantly throwing out... something he could use to however he sees fit: cold, hard, simple words that I can repeatedly stuff in place and know Tim won't somehow grab _I'm fine_ and whip easy words into use—what use? No use.

An abrupt stop sends me reeling into a bank of black fluff. "Tell me the feeling lodged in your throat—explain it," he words slowly, weaving through a throaty growl, "and I will finish our route to your pesky little friend." And thus I stutter in place. Once his intentions settle, I can only mumble:

"A little cold. A little tired. A little afraid." The royal accent doesn't quite frame with admitting fear, but my mind reels on the naïve oshawott, and I couldn't care less about a pointy speech if it burns out Zoey's life. "Now please can we find her—?"

The wall of darkness doesn't look at me or voice another concern, but the taut pull in my hand slackens, the pace strengthens, and the shadows encircling us seem to loosen from their grip on the skies. He almost displays a sense of humane—understanding, real feelings stuffed under his layers of fur—reasoning in these moments: almost, only just falling short. I freely doubt I—or anyone, truly—will ever be blessed by the sight of an emotional timburr in the body of this character. Simply, without question, the dark colors and dankness don't shift or allow room.

They simply do not. Even as so, did Tim not volunteer to assist me, Zoey could be lying lifeless: a soggy carcass without breath to allow her to craft her squishy, wet footprints: nothing more; did Tim not exist whatsoever or at least traumatize another entity, Zoey would not be in this position. Why does he speak in such riddles, like I'm so important and he's so important and I must be in arm's length for him. Like I am a warbling child that requires infinite attention. A shiver, a sniffle, and I pocket the thoughts. If the timburr would release of me, if he would stop such stifling watches, could I prove that I'm not so small to his eyes?

Or is this part of his... vow to me, that he's the...

the...

No.

Tim can't. If he did then Elijah wouldn't be dead and Lady Munaah wouldn't have lived such a short, desperate, depressing life and the castle in the sky wouldn't be painted crimson on see-through ice that overhung to a dreary beat before its collapse and our win, their defeat. They lost because they're the monsters: Darkie, Munaah, Purrple, Toxic, each and every of the little league leaders of that gang; much more serious than a gang should be. But that's because they're my opposites; they're the Bittercold; they're the reason Elijah died. And we're... more serious than a team.

Strings in my heart slide to a lulling notion that oddly soothes me. They pluck gently, but seem to strum me with just the right tuning. We're more serious than a team. These creatures mean a great much to me, each one of the members. Not even she—Darkie—could smash us apart.

Darkie: the childish legend pooling with black energy; a bipedal commonly referred to with the species name of darkrai; the monster that aided Lady Munaah in her exploit of my group of teammates and myself: of my home and those I love.

As insignificant as she showed herself, my mind blanks at odd times and I soon find the white canvas painted with shadows and uprisings—notices that perchance Darkie was there in the shadows, conducting a little experiment on us.

I don't know if her presence actually did cross ours so often as the tricks in my head perceive it, and I honestly would rather be without knowing that total—a messy glob of blackened crust that spreads like an epidemic is enough to see with my own eyes. An abrupt jolt in my arm wakens me from the slight torpor: the shadows alone could enshroud me without my realization, sucking me off from sight of the world again.

My stomach pinches as the thought dawns on me that Tim, unlike my dear best friend, can easily wrangle me under his watch and keep us close together, especially in these dark corridors; while Zoey, the sweet water mammal, has lost sight of me quite a handful of times in Mystery Dungeons—a bright memory of a dusty volcano as Zoey blindly stumbled ahead, losing in sight of me, threatens to take me down. But I stand like an enemy and brace the grit tossed, the pelleting of fake ideals almost shredding me apart.

Only memories.

Memories I want to drown and lose from their ethereal chains linked always back to me, no matter how multifarious the road betwixt carves itself. Always back to me. I suppose I in my own happen to be ethereal as well, comparing toward the general and forever use of my humorously-labeled Sweethot for this heavy meaning behind.

And I cannot allow myself to believe that Tim is ethereal like I am, or else he has crowned himself a monster that has demolished he who I love and loved, and I stand no chance of eventually releasing the chains of these deaths and blood from my back; perchance I do not fight in Mystery Dungeon skirmishes or the haughty battles either, but the weight shackles me.

"Pay attention."

"To whom?"

He doesn't smirk, doesn't look, only whispers gently in his deep tone: "To me."

For a soft moment I don't say anything, and I feel incapable of saying, for to say would be to shatter the burst of warmth spreading over my scales that I can't even explain except for stop: Stop, Tim, whatever you're trying to pull off. Halt. Cease. End.

What is it with you? cries a voice in the edges of my mind; yet I don't know what to tell it in return. No answer satisfies me enough to calm the maelstrom inside.

That looseness in Tim's new grasp renders me unable to notice he's stopped his lulling pace, and I nearly stumble into the thickets with none but his big, black hand to hold me back. "We've just about arrived." Whistling and whining in the winds directs trees to point their skeleton-like, blackened tips and the ends of the whorls to a sickeningly dark hole in the forest. I do recognize Mystery Dungeon entrances and their strange, warped, portal-like appearances, but this is equivalent to a cavity, a cavity numbly munching away at life: a black hole here on Truught; here on trouble isle.

With a sliver of a glance from one of his eyes, a pressing urge to speak pinches me: "It reminds me of the Bitter Springs." Where I'd lost her prior. Those woodlands that I lost sight of her and I can't lose sight of her again. I'll remember them—I'll reopen wounds—for her. For Zoey. Anything for Zoey. The naïve oshawott, the waterlogged mammal with the bright beam dripping down the sides of her pearly white fur: anything for Zoey.

Tim, placing a squeeze in my hand that I feel fingers bend the slightest but not the gesture behind, points out with his other palm facing out, clawed tips reaching for the black cavity. "There."

"Yes," I mumble, "yes."

He nods—a solemn, simple notion. And it's much more than what I can muster as the muscular biped tugs me finally into the cold, dark gap of space and time, where not even the continuum has room to catch us should we fall. A brush of icy chill, a pocket of darkness, and the sensations wipe away to reveal a darker, more crowded atmosphere: having no experience with nature, even to my grass type affiliation, staring up at the death-like treetops only wriggles around toxic thoughts in my stomach. Why Jen would allow the oshawott to stumble in here is a mystery I couldn't bother solving.

Childish and painfully innocent as she is, Zoey couldn't have seen what Tim and I must glimpse from the blackened springs and cold, noisy atmosphere, where each breath practically begs to be choked on. From the information derived, she could have assumed through those foggy river-blue eyes that she and the bagon were clambering into a rainbow-dyed haven; though I do pertain enough trust in Zoey that she didn't quite see such a wonderland. So—why? Why come? Why bother? Of course it doesn't matter as long as I find her.

"Your friend is a strange pest," idly comments Tim.

With a shrug between yellow shoulders, I counter, "But I love her." He doesn't speak again, but the breath I already struggle to pump seems to squeeze just past my grasp. Tim didn't like that, quite painfully obvious; I still felt that trill in my heart to let it out. Zoey. For Zoey. Anything for Zoey, my beloved friend.

As I finally find myself released from Tim's black-furred grip, the horizons seem to expand before me: shadows stay unrolled like carpet on the Mystery Dungeon's great interior, and yet little mounds of color align in odd cracks and corners of the trees or outstretched leaves, as if fingers pointing out to show off a rainbow. Its tiny and yet so dear rainbow. Even with darkness papered about us in fleeting steps, from fleeting so encompassing to everywhere, blackness spreading like an epidemic, there's the cracks, and those cracks provide enough light to assure me we'll find her.

Oh, Zoey, why would you wander into such a torture chamber like so? And how—how could you allow this to befall you? Even ignoring her tendency to clumsily make mistakes, I can't see how this monstrosity reeking, reeking of pain and suffering and darkness, could foster her bright spirit for even a moment. It's strange, is all. A strange sight that crawls up and downright dies in my throat.

"You care about her—a lot," goes the rumble of Tim's deep voice.

"Yes. I do."

And again he doesn't respond.

While we creep, tiptoeing through broken leaves lying in tatters on the moist forest floor between patches of dreary, black gleams, creatures of this cavity spring out at random intervals and attempt a halfhearted go at harming Tim or the likes of myself: claws slide past prior to Tim's own weaponry—much larger and crimson than the other pairs—and his attack back that pulls the poor soul down.

Honestly, without focus or care or any of the grace Stella could nod me for, I stumble about in the muck of death and decomposition, as sticky bits of the rubbish begin to scale about me and print like stubborn pads from children, pasted as it wishes upon me. Tim, sighting this like he'd assured me through his protection pleas, balances that hand over my shoulder and seems to collect me up.

I don't feel much. Flecks of the world spin while others don't move whatsoever. And all the while it's just banging in my head, tinted the slightest, searching for a match with her. My breath catches. It falls. Like I dropped it but I haven't I need to find her—

Zoey.

And the breath picks up. Runs. Runs away from me. Zoey Zoey Zoey. So small. Kind. Little. Sweet. Naive. Doesn't deserve it. Doesn't deserve death she has to be okay she's so much younger than me, so much younger than Elijah even. And she can't go too. She can't leave me here like this. No. Zoey. This is my Zoey, my best friend.

Too young.  
Too naïve.  
Too clumsy.

Too... no. Zoey. No. I suddenly flail out of Tim's grip and hit the ground. Breath billows about me with a hiss but I pick myself up and tiny pale toes scrabble over hard-dried muck and cry for a safety. A safety. A Zoey. Zoey. Zoey. The chant picks up in my little head and it roams like Zoey, Zoey, Zoey so I can't forget her.

I scramble to and fro. Past enemies. Past monsters with gleaming eyes. Or claws. Or fangs. Or anything and the breath beats down my neck but Zoey and she could be hurt she could be dying and Zoey. Zoey don't die don't die on me don't die on them don't die on anyone: live. Bruises color my otherwise sunlit-pale belly but it doesn't matter. Nothing matters. Nothing matters but life—not losing another soul. Not letting Zoey tumble into the looming abyss.

If not for a moment I believe Tim, I believe every word he's ever sharpened and cut me with. I divulge and intake every last whisper of him being it of him being the Bittercold. If it will let me find her. This Dungeon only struggles onward, not up or down but on and on and on and on and on. And tress and on and on. And muck and on and on. Broken leaves and on and on. No sunlight and on and on.

Where is Tim?

On and on.

It matters not if I believe those petty words that stab me or whether the tang of his warm, dark breath is in the air I suck in and out so pathetically but Zoey. And Tim as well and Tim don't kill her don't you kill her

and a moving shadow flitting and front of me and

YOU SAID YOU WOULDN'T KILL HER

DON'T KILL HER, TIM. DON'T KILL ZOEY.

ZOEY. Zoey. Zoey... zoey zoey zoeyzoeyzoeyzoeyzoeyzoeyzoeyzoey

My footprints: _splat splat splatsplatsplatsplatsplatsplatsplatsplat-_

_fumplat._

My falling into black, broken, bloodied muck mixed in with chunks of dirt and sinew and water and anything else that reeks and leaks into my throat. I tremble, cough some: a dirtied squeal, if I've ever heard of before. Still, a sickening bit of royalty that can never seem to leave my voice taints the cry. But not... not all that far ahead... when my auburn orbs narrow and pinch together...

The moving shadow has finished its aforementioned crime. It sits like an abiotic nothing beside what appears to be a lying bit of blue sludge, spilled over with whites and other ocean-like hues. Its own raspy cough resembles the ocean in its seawater-y accent—and the lassitude inside of me weakens. Sudden adrenaline surges within me and I take one crawling stumble, another, another, another, until the white face trembles before me. River-blue eyes pour open with tears and I think they see the pale green nose pointed just above.

"A-ah..." A sneeze. A choked sob forced back. "Llana... y-you're all... mucked up..."

The drop in her tone, broken down from every last bit of joy, of optimism, of glee, pretended or not, is evident, evident enough to leave a cold scar in place of what I've always known as Zoey's voice.

Her eyes, once so lively, now foster deep, dark coals. She's upset. She's sad. She's in pain. Zoey. "Is it... be-because of... me?"

All I can manage is to shake my head—a painful little margin—and wrap my fingers around her head and pull her close to me, close enough that the water in my eyes tips over and splashes upon the muck and blood coating her fur, alongside her own tears. "I love you, Zoey... I love you.

"And it doesn't matter if it was your fault or not, because I won't let you go. Never." My voice rasps. "Never." In the damp atmosphere, I hardly tell whether or not I've regained strength or it really is the royal Stella speaking through me when words don't want to come, and words only flood and flail and—and fall. Fall apart.

We say we can't explain how we feel, so we push those pent-up emotions under a single word: love. And we understand, this mutual feeling, as entities, what is going on beneath the skin, deep in the heart with each pounding breath below.

I just barely feel the sob in my mouth over the heartbeat in my ears, Zoey's little and mighty vessel pumping what it can to go on. And I hear it, I hear it—she'll live she'll live she'll live. The mighty little oshawott will live. With a sag, I fall into mounds of her blue-furred belly, and I let the cool, wet tears spill where they wish.

"W-wow..." she squeaks softly, "I never thought your heart would beat so... loudly..." A sniffle, and her tone has already inflated just the lightest. Zoey will be okay. "Uuhuuu... I... I guess that's what you hear now. You hear... m-mine..." Another sniffle. "Uu..."

Inside of the cries, inside of the tears, inside of our own personal rainstorm, I have this feeling our emotions have already washed away the muck on our skin, but that these feelings of pure emotion for one another will carve deep inside of us and wash away the pain that's been tormenting for a great, long time. This mutual bond we share—that we know we share—that we can fill with that word, love—cannot die. I know that no matter how much turmoil flows between us, no matter how much backwash spills, these tears—and much more—have burned our paths together. Ever since that fated morning, the morning after my uncle left me to die on his own and Stella dispersed, leaving me alone, as did her best friend lose his life just the same day prior, that we met, and those paths entwined.

Forever, may I add. Forever.

Forever indeed.

Forever, indubitably.

Once the tears have ceased to flow, and the coldness of our actual positions with the wind begging to blow us apart thoroughly proven, I stand on the hard-dried muck once more, ignoring any _squirch _of a side effect, with Zoey's fluffy white arm precariously draped over my shoulder area. Her other hand clutches onto the one of mine closest to her weakly tottering body.

"You'll be okay," I murmur.

A giggle—Zoey. Zoey's giggle: obvious proof of recovery. Each evidence only highlights the moment. "Yes, Llana! I'll be fine! How many times have you asked that?"

"Not enough," I respond. "Never enough. You have to be okay."

"Okay, indubitably!" comes her cry. "Ha—haaaaaaah!" The use of our overused word pinches softly in my heart. _Okay, indubitably! Indubitably! _She'll live. She'll live. Warm breath seems to cascade over me with each revelation. That she'll be okay. She'll live. My best friend will most indubitably live. Indubitably; indubitably; in-du-bi-ta-bly: yes.

The overflow of joy wants to wash me away. But still I stand, in mounds of dead leaves and other sinews I'd rather not indulge on, with a stumbling oshawott balancing by my shoulder. Her naturally long, deep blue ears flick waters about me with each slap on the back, and each time my heart only jumps higher.

A voice hurdles into me like a stone, nearly knocking away the new kingdom reining in my heart: "Jen." Deep and dark and warmth-flowing, even as far away as it is. Zoey recognizes the shadow-like biped as well and her white fingers squeeze at me. River-blue eyes cut sharp and narrow. "She's nearby; found a friend, I believe."

"Yello, Tim." The greeting from my cheerful companion comes cropped and obviously capsized.

He notes this, takes it into acknowledgment, with a nod. "Zoey."

She wants to say more—I feel her edginess between her fingers to my scales—but nothing comes out. Only a whisper to me pours out the corner of her shaking lips: "He's been messing with me, you know."

"Yes," comes my reply, "yes, I know, and I made him come back."

A stifled giggle. "Nice." My face slightly reddens, but nothing else signifies our conversation ever occurred. This only causes Zoey to choke harder on the laugh. Thankfully, nothing spills over—I only know how well Tim wants to harm my dear friend, and any reason that makes him feel lesser could slit her throat. This jolts my heart back into motion, and I nod to the timburr.

I wish there was a way to forever uphold surveillance over the oshawott, to be sure Tim will never harm her again or think of trying to. Characters arise in my head—Burr himself, the goofy timburr not even Tim dared to rally against; his girlfriend, Mina, whose long, thick scar just may keep Tim from thinking to attack; other friends and other voices, each of a power much more just than Zoey's or mine—or my lack thereof.

"Well? Do you want me to take you to her?"

"Yes, please," I murmur to the ground.

"Indubitably!" squeals Zoey.

She'll be okay; she'll be okay. At least for now, I feel the warmth radiating from her wet coat and the smile drizzling down her face. Zoey is here.

And we'll find Jen and this apparent _friend_: safe, I should hope, crossing my fingers together where they do or don't connect with the water mammal atop me. And I am the Hope; I am the Sweethot.

My eyes swim over Tim's smoky surface, and the words from my last chat with Stella come throbbing back at me:

_filthy scum._

Her beautiful, white muzzle comes streaking through me and the purple eyes radiate with such a brilliance as she cries that I have to live but he can't but if he dies I die and I can't die I can't die I can't die.

I don't want to believe that Tim is the monster, and that he killed Elijah, and even though my beloved emolga has lost his life this murderer continues to rein with me under his finger; but what choice to I have? Stella has spit at who I believe is him: filthy scum. And she's afraid for me—the great fluffy one in the skies is afraid.

All I can do is clasp with Zoey's pairs of hands and believe Jen has at least pertained without injury.

**Eheheheh. Been looking forward to this chapter. Tim's being leery; Zoey's been caught in a bad position; oh and Jen, what about Jen? Eheheh, I guess we'll find out soon. ^^ **

**Zoey: TIMMY TIM STOP BEING A BUMHOLE.**

**Tim: You have no idea how much I'd love to kill you. And I could. But I don't.**

**Zoey: -sticks her tongue out at him- PBBBBTTTTT~! **

**Me: owo Open fire. -grabs umbrella- Pfft. **

**Zoey: TIM, YOU'RE NOT THE BITTERCOLD. YOU'RE THE FILTHYSCUM.**

**Tim: oh that's it. -begins running at her-**


	9. rolls Around

Chapter 9: ...rolls Around

Zoey wobbling as she latches fitfully upon my shoulder, Tim's shadow-like self leading our way, we go on; it's all we can do now. Fitful images, wavering always, offer glimpses of the cyan dragonet with the coiling, silvery braids draping down her back as they—and she as well—spiral into oblivion. The amber orbs fixated just above her bulbous nose would be as dark as the pit she swells into through my nightmares of daydreams. Zoey clings onto me; I cling onto hope: Tim didn't recognize my words when I revealed that Jen was with Zoey on their odd Mystery Dungeon request. He didn't know. He couldn't have lumbered off and slit the young dragon's throat, not as I hung at him like Zoey does for me now.

And if Tim hasn't hurt Jen, she must be wobbling about the blackened trees in search of Zoey, who wobbles as it is. They do make quite a pair—another plausible reason the duo found themselves in this twisted killing device of a Dungeon and didn't question it. Either way, a warm bud blooming in my heart assures not to worry about the other of Zoey's pitiful team number.

Feeling the continuous heat-stained glance from coal eyes in the front, I ask Tim: "Do you know what this place is called?"

He likes being acknowledged. He hates feeling as if I like Zoey more than him—even if I do; and I do, I do, I do. The tall, shadowy timburr is practically a shadow already to the vivacious oshawott and what joy she alights upon me.

"I doubt it has a name. The hate pooling from this Mystery Dungeon already suggests that the souls who stumbled in here—by my own willing or without"—and he brought it up—"found themselves dead quite soon."

"Like the Glacial Palace," I muse softly.

He also rather enjoys when I mention memories, painful or not quite so. With a ball of worrisome spit lodging in my throat, fearfully peering out at Tim with each breath I pant, I take these thoughts and spin them, and use them, so that another day or more may be granted for Zoey's life to breathe another breath: to live. Live, Zoey, live.

I doubt she even realizes how close her lifeline is—right now; at every given moment thus far with this black-furred creature in existence—to being snipped away from me.

"Not actually like that ice hole. The idiot held with fake leadership there was only a minor puppet of an idiot legendary; she's tried to spin her own lies about me, but such also includes my own killing of you: I plan to stray rather far away from that. You have quite the lovely head on your delicate shoulders." Each word uttered by his deep, dark tone seems to weigh me down; I truly do not feel well-acquitted with the timburr and his sly ways. This doesn't explain the odd attraction he seems to pertain for... me.

Would I like Tim more did he not claim to kill Elijah—or did not threaten to end Zoey's life as well? Imagining such a bright outlook on my life seems to jump in my heart slightly; yes, I would prefer if the shadowy one didn't try to cut my heart open and take it for himself.

Enough learning that not only Elijah but apparently he feels an odd connection to me; I'm sure I could figure a way to work around the circumstance did he not simply decide to... narrow the competition—is it a competition? Am I being fought over? Am I worth this... whatever this is?

Zoey mumbles an incoherent string of lines beside me, and something watery and bubbly spills from her lips. The drool quickly sticks to my back. Although the slow trickle of mouth fluid creeps down my pale scaled back to a slimy, sticky fashion, only an odd twist of warm, enjoyable elation holds me—that Zoey does happen to be alive at this moment to be able to drool on me in any form.

I don't want Tim to kill her. I don't want Tim to touch her—I don't want Tim to turn back and stare at me and simply ask with those coal orbs to please him for the umpteenth time. But I do; and I do; repeatedly, biting my tongue and invisibly pleading that this silent tyranny end. What a shame I find no strength in ability to attack him. To simply do away with those words.

As much as I value my inability to harm another creature, Tim has created himself an exception in enough occasions for me to break this as well. The thoughts sink and stick in my mouth angrily, and my spirits lower in such notions—but I can't seem to shake him off of me, either way.

I wish he would stop, is all.

But there's nothing I can do except for shove the emotional burdens over my shoulder and continue trekking on. Eventually, the topic laments in my head, floating softly like flowers caught in the wind, I will drop the idea altogether; it happens to be in my nature. And that is all.

Though stumbling onward with an unexpectedly weighty oshawott—as her fur is stuffed with water—I don't grow woozy or lose neatness of thought prior to our first encounter with who must be Jen's friend. My pale toes only bend and wriggle on until Tim's heavy footprints stop thudding and I look up and my auburn gaze skids upon the green-spine-adhering creature spitting an ensemble of words back. The timburr merely gives a curt nod and jabs a stubby, fluffy finger toward me as I unceremoniously collapse beneath Zoey's weight beside.

"Who ya got 'ere, loosa?" grumbles the creature. A mucky brown face—furry in its best—pokes under the muck covering me and catches a look toward my face. "Mm. A guurrrll." The deep, well-rounded tone strikes me like Victini's—no: F's—would, only his to be slightly more masculine and to a many-octaves lower voice. "Gee, boi, what's up with da feeemale?" A smattering of lips; he spits loudly and quickly on the soil.

"I have another female, actually." Tim, in response, bluntly kicks at Zoey's white forehead; a gurgling grunt is all I have to know this action was confirmed. "And stay away from them. They're my business alone."

The sudden sensation of soft, long furs shivers down my stomach, and I let out a quiet squeak as Tim plucks me from the ground and holds me like so in front of the biped below. His green-as-spines eyes bulge slightly, but no such a snide remark ensues. "Oh, ya like _dat, den?_" Another wad of spit bullets into grubby leaves.

At his words, I struggle in Tim's hands, but his clench prevents much movement; the muscles ripple threateningly as I wriggle through the notion; I know the timburr won't harm me, but I'd much rather not be so close to his black-furred self, especially in such a dark forest. "Oi, whutevah, man. I got enough to deal with, meetin' dis gurl o' my own. She's big trouble, yo, but she's enjoyable. Squeals a lot like dat."

_Jen, _Zoey's lips move just the slightest from below.

This creature has our friend directly in his clutches, and he just revealed this information.

"Does your 'gurl' happen to be searching for anyone else of revealed information?" Tim grunts.

A snort. "Like 'eck I'd jus' give 'er over to a creep the likes o' ya." The creature—chespin, if I'm not mistaken—comfortably flexes the long, fine needles on his back. "Whuteva, don't gotta mess with ya weirdos. I got me a gurl to deal wi', too. So adios, er whuteva." And the brown streak scrambles off into the obsidian forest without another word, the skeleton trees arcing out past him and his paths until _swishwishwishhhhiing _into their places again.

"Jen."

"Yes, Llana." By his sudden mood swing, the fact that I do love Jen but don't appear so visibly attached to her as I am Zoey is evident in his acceptance of this. "I'll find her for you."

_...for you. _My cheeks heat; my heart screams; my eyes slap themselves shut; my mouth quivers—and I don't know how to feel. Tim's dark hand slips from my side, soon squishing a wet-furred creature beside me. With our smaller selves bundled up in his muscled arms, the timburr continues on. At the least, he's momentarily cooled over his smoldering dislike for the oshawott I so dearly love.

How funny that the timburr declares to like me and pleads for my forgiveness, then easily flips his own switch and nearly cuts Zoey's lifeline however many times he sees fit until he's sure I'm tied around one claw and I cannot escape. Why he plays with me, like I'm a child or a sort of prey to mock until the final strike—though this is a final strike I'll supposedly never experience—is a mystery, a mystery I don't want to know or truly care for. But this is who I am as well. Always have been; always will be.

Thankfully, with Zoey and I stowed away in his arms, Tim easy and quickly takes bounds through crusted-over leaves and other browned rubbish to keep track of the green-spiked mammal first out of glimpse, but then jumping into green and mottled-brown shots until finally bounding with much smaller, slower steps straight in front of Tim and our little group ensnared in front of him. But like a shadow, Tim is careful to drop behind in ability to not disturb his new prey, hiding between the dead or nigh-dying trees scattered about the Mystery Dungeon; I hold my breath and clasp one of Zoey's wet, white hands, trusting that soon we'll steal Jen back to our short-female team alongside Tim and manage an escape in a more orderly, simple, easygoing manner.

Eventually, the spiked one stumbles upon a large hollow in the woodland: a great, thick-ringed tree the color of a less stark charcoal with slight brown highlights littered about its mostly-black composure. Small cracks do open beneath branches and propel enough light to see the brown hues. In the hole protruding from the tree itself, like a painfully obvious doorway only begging to be seen, is where the chespin wanders on in. A small glow of light—flame, perchance?—emits from the midst of the hollow, and dragon energy—Jen's own fire providing sight and warmth—practically lashes out at each of us.

Tim, stopping at the step of the door of sorts, thrusts Zoey onto the ground and lightly releases me next, our small heads rustling on gnarled tree roots while the timburr springs into motion, the only proof that his attack ensued a cry of "ow!" in a husky, melodramatic squeak.

The chespin. The one with Jen cradled in his grasp. He lives in a Mystery Dungeon—one this dreary, even—just as she had with the bright green confines of Forest Grotto until chancing upon our group of Paradise teammates. Heart leaping from my chest, I already want to welcome the creature.

"Aaah! Tim!" The light tone burns in my ears as I open my eyes and pull myself up alongside the oshawott on the gnarled ground with me. For a sharp moment, my eyes stab from the bright welcoming of the flames, but slowly, with a wet hand squeezing mine, I stumble into the tree. "A-ah! Ah! Zoey, you're okay! And... and... Llana! Llana, you're okay too!"

_taptaptaptapWHUMP. _Jen's lithe footsteps linger as an afterthought when she springs at me. My back rides parallel with gnarled flooring before cracking in place with the brown plant matter. Zoey, for good measure, lands atop the bagon as well. "You're okay, Jen! You're better than okay—you're all jumpy and you look real happy, too! You got your friend over there?"

"Yeah, see, I really li—"

The well-rounded speak of her friend—captor?—interrupts: _"Ey, loosa! Get outta 'ere!"_

Jen twitches in her bumpy position. "Yep. That's... him. He sounds... more than a little peeved with you guys." A swish of long braids, and the cyan reptile slides down from mine and Zoey's grips, pulling the both of us up with her. "So, uh, here's where I've been staying," she utters, for lack of other explanation to the hollow.

My eyes first catch, though swerve back again, on the lights. Side by side on the parallel walls, stone funnels hold a flickering orange flame that crackles and sparks in its form freely. This simple pair illuminates the entire tree hollow in all of its tiny glory. Perchance Jen did assist in this addition? In the direct middle of the brown hollow, shifting with brown and darker shadows, is a small, smooth, circular table with smaller stumps of chairs scattered about it. A single, though roomy-sized, bed of hay lies in tatters on the edge of the single room, where the chespin now scrambles back from the timburr in.

_"Lay off, wouldya?"  
_

"No," is his singular answer. A twinge in my heart; I knew to an extent Tim's reasoning would be such.

With a cry and a flop, Jen struggles into the arms of each male, somehow simultaneously pushing the growling creatures back and not finding herself skewered by any natural weapon. "Let's not do this! Please! Roland, these are the friends that're looking for me; and Tim, Roland's the guy that watched over me! I don't know if I'd be alive, did he not find me!"

The name chimes a bell in my head: Roland.

As she shakes out from her near-torpor, Zoey tips to my side and mumbles to me, cold fingers still tied to me snugly, "That ugly bugger's been saving Jen's bum? Well... he did help her. I'll have to accept him." As does in silly or stressful situations, the water mammal's tone squeezes out and compresses again with her seawater accent. "Mm... maybe. Maybe. How about you, Llana?"

She takes a glimpse into my starstruck eyes. "Okay, yeah. You're on team Jen." With a giggle, Zoey nods her white head at this, her long dark ears swinging softly by each side. "Wonder how Tim will take the news."

"He knows who I am as you do, Zoey."

Another high-pitched frenzy of giggles. "Yeah, but he doesn't know _you!_" Although her words struggle to catch me in my nadir of worry, another part of me relents that yes, he does know me, in the single wrench of my heart. If he tried to understand me more like Elijah or Zoey or Jen had come to acquaintance, and the first hadn't been apparently baited to death, maybe he would come on terms with me as well.

Though I doubt the smoky-furred biped with the doubled pairs of hair gliding down to his shoulders and large tuft in the middle of his forehead, with the uneasy appearance, with the threateningly throbbing pink markings on the sides of his head to shoulders to knees—he wouldn't take the path I want him to. I wish he did.

"Jyen! Wassup wi' ya? I told ya to kee'back! Deese guys're bad juju, Jyen, baaaaad juju." My head twitches in the makings of a headache with that cocky retort, but the bagon's eyes steam—tears?—smoke? Anger?

"These... Roland, these are my friends! Please, listen to them—to me! They're good pokemon, and I'm sure they want to help you too!" A cyan fist goes sprawling in my direction, a thick-padded thumb jutting out more toward me than Zoey. The oshawott—noting this and already knowing why as well—merely sniggers. My heart still twitches and races at that rude spiked boy.

He pulls back a stubby, brown arm, claws shrinking back. At his reaction, my heart squeezes and the tension seems to crack for a moment: acceptance? A wave?

The fingers lay flat out as Roland directly slaps Jen across the face. _WHAP!_

_THAK—_and I lay there, flat on my back, on the rooted ground, falling from the pure irony of the situation. Somehow, my body doesn't register any of the pain; I sit there stiffly, numbly, my brain sorely accusing me of being an idiot.

So Roland is not who I'd assume the grass creature to be: not very kind, even to Jen. A red welt probably dances over her thick, cyan scales now. "I told ya, we don't do business wi' strangaas."

"They're not strangers, Roland." Jen somehow forces the words past the tears I can only feel she's stuffed inside of her, trying to flush them away. Don't be ashamed, poor girl: he should be the shamed one here.

_WHAP! _"Dey are. I dunno dem." _WHA—_

_thunk. _Even from my position the boulder-like hand furled into a fist and bludgeoning Roland on the head is painfully obvious. "_Ey! _Ya steey ou'a dis!"

Even from my position I can tell the coal orbs have narrowed and he's shaken his head. "No." Expected as well. The dark drawl continues. "I know her, and I'd like to have her back without any prior harm. As well, you've gotten Llana to faint; I don't take that lightly." My scales crawl; of course you don't take that lightly.

A sigh softly puffing its way out of my mouth, I deliberate over the matter: perchance there are still characters like Roland, creatures that don't care for those who reach out their hands and try to assist others. In the back of my mind, I recall what Burr's told me multiple times before, about how I have this energy that seems to collect others toward me.

If Tim is what he claims to be, he could be pestering with my own aura using his own, the great cloaking unease I've always sifted in when he arrives to grace my presence. We would be... grinding upon each other in times like these.

If—my heart jumps; I swallow it back down—if Tim is what he's told me he is, to remove him from this orange-lit hollow would be to render the quarrelsome chespin able to see and accept me, as he does—somewhat—to Jen. Perchance would he not have slapped the bagon did the smoky timburr not stand in his way?

Again, my heart leaps; again, I swallow it into my chest. It appears I can't stand to deny what Tim's told me: his evidence is too profuse, too encompassing; too much. He... did set out Elijah as bait to be killed by Lady Munaah or a follower—those lampents, the flame-wielding bipeds strung to life from darkness. I know this; he did; he wants to string out and fry Zoey's life as well. I simply have run out of ways to deny what I don't want to be true, and I need to learn how to divulge this information.

My heart pangs and bays out a slow, sad song: I miss Elijah. I miss the cheeky emolga, the winged mammal charged with electricity and a beam to match, his off-made side remarks.

Tim. Tim wanted me to remember, forced thoughts in my head to be spilled through my mouth to keep him happy: he's towing memories side-by-side through my mind, cranking up a business I'd just as quickly shut down: and I don't know whether I want to stop the constant flow or not. I... I do like the fleeting flashes of recalling what I've been through—what we've been through—and... the old memories of Elijah before he found himself dead fill me... with a warmth, and a squeeze around my shoulders, like a sort of hug from his soul.

Somewhere in my chest, with the squeeze around my shoulders ringing about my heart, I know that if the choice was given, I would replace Tim's dark, sly, nerve-inducing self with Elijah—if he had to become the... the Bittercold himself, so be it.

So be it.

Quietly, one solid silent moment after another, the black-furred creature up and in front of me seems to take in and divulge what I've been considering at the moment: if he is the Bittercold, he still should know well enough how Roland has been treating our mostly-cheerful group. With a grunt, he ducks back out of the hollow's opening and leaves the space for Jen and Zoey and myself to resolve with the stricken chespin.

Wet fingers grope for my hand and string me up again. I face the—slightly—taller grass creature, my pale face to his brown. "I'm terribly sorry for your rude awakening from our team." Already, I drop to my case; the faster I can remove vibrant images of the provocative timburr, the better. "We heard that you held a female in your home, and Zoey here and myself"—I gesture for the both of us, my green-scaled fingers settling on her blue chest and then my pale one—"thought—rather correctly—it was our missing friend. We accidentally stumbled in this Mystery Dungeon."

It takes a long moment, one allowing my heart to scramble back and scream in my throat, but Roland gives a sharp nod: short and sweet, but pure acceptance. "A-ah. Thank you. My name is Llana, and now you know Zoey, and Jen as well, of our... Paradise." I take a step back, give a bow. "Thank you for keeping our friend... safe."

His pine green eyes scatter over for the bagon hugging his one side. "A-aye, 'ndeed. Sorry bout dat, Jyen. Ah... I dunno wh'came ova me... urrgh." He suddenly shakes himself. The needles on his back shiver closely to his newfangled companions. "So, yeh, I'm Roland. Yer Llana?"

"Yes." Another nod—politeness seems to count with him. Roland, despite the accent, prefers a more mannerly approach, it seems. At least, he's calmed remarkably well after Tim came and threw himself in his face. I suppose he's not as much like F the victini as I'd thought—though their voices sound quite similar.

"Well, Jyen n' I've 'ad some stuff to bond over. She us' t'be livin' in one'a deese dumps too, y'know?" I nod again to show yes, I'know. "Yeh. She said youzen' Zoey ova dere're good guys n' ya got utha buddies, too. Dat yer team's real shipshape n' all dat. I's dinkin' I mi' jus' 'ave ta join ya fools. Plus, I don' min' watchin' ova Jyen. She cool, yeh, she cool."

Zoey magically pops from my side again. "Ooh, really? If you like Jen, you'd just love Bay! He and she are like super tight! Especially after, y'know—oh wait no you don't. Well, it's not important." My mind flashes back to when Zoey and I first met, how she used words of similar diction to attempt and kick dust over the secrets littered within. Calling Elijah and his death unimportant is simply her way of trying to pull the newcomer chespin from our team's most powerful bonding—over fears as well—as of yet.

"Well, you'd like Umbre a lot too, I bet. He's kooky like that. And Espa's funny and cool when she's not cranky. Then again, she's been reaaaallly cranky lately. Wonder why. Anyway, there's also... um..." She chews on her lip thoughtfully. "Like, Virizion and Victini!"

She doesn't know of the nicknames; she was trapped in this torture hole. "Vivi and F," I mutter out of the corner of my mouth.

"Oop, my bad: Vivi and F! Oh, and who knows—maybe you'll get to know Vivi's special friend too! He's kinda shy, and hates hearing his name aloud a lot but... you never know." A final shrug ends the conversation. I consider what I could add in an attempt to smother Roland's persuasion when a great ball of gleaming fire bursts straight through Roland's tree's lovely though gnarled trunk. The bark squeals from impact; a great wad of a light-fused hole peels open through. A red ear batters against the side; doesn't fit; a curse.

Another attempt. Another curse. "Gaaawwsshhh, like, open already! Stupid! Get big and, like, fat, you big hole! Like, stupid! Gawsh already!" F appears to have glanced upon us. I do recall that she flits about each and every Mystery Dungeon to take in notes and noticing about who-needs-help or who-looks-like-a-bad-guy or who-might-want-to-join-Paradise or other who's of the sort.

Why is she glancing in on such a Mystery Dungeon? "Ugh, Llana, Zoey, like, Jen, there you are! We gotta like get back to Paradise lickety split, gawsh dang it! OPEN UP ALREADY!"

_sshhhhftttt—klik_

The magical hole of light energy in the tree splits wide open, and out tumbles the velvet-eared biped herself, proudly puffing out her cream chest. "Theeeeere we go!" F proclaims, shaking the accumulation of feathers on her legs quite proudly. "Like, yes! Okay now we need to leave."

"What?"

Jen, catching the nicknames I'd spilled prior, squeaks: "F? What's happening? Why are we going?"

She winks at her own name. "Whaaaii, dat's a surpriiiiise! Like get in now." I don't know if she recognized Roland or refused to.

"F?" I mumble. "F? What's this—"

"COME ON! WE NEED TO LIKE GO! GAWSH!" Red-hot fingers and nails dig into some part of my scaled body and abruptly toss me into the Mystery Dungeon hole. Another body buffets me from behind, and another, until I can't tell if Roland has followed our lead or not and F hops right in and the light dies and we spiral out of the illusion of the Dungeon.

Where... are we going..?

**Aaah, F's getting really fun to use now. x3 Er, should I say F for Fun?**

**F: Yes. Yes. You'd like better.**

**Me: Yep got it. **

**Roland the chespin here is an OC given to me by GMSK758, so thank you very much for him! He's a pretty interesting guy, I have to say. x3 Enjoy using him, especially alongside F. I mean, we haven't seen that much, but I can imagine it.  
Thank ya for reading~ ^^**


	10. Babies

Chapter 10: Babies

We erupt into what feels like bright, molten, spontaneous puke on the grass of Paradise after a red-hot shaking and bashing and screaming and squirming and crawling through a steaming mess of being flung through dark corridors where one can't even see the hand just in front of them, or the navy blue ear their best friend declares one sat on multiple times through quite the rude awakening. I twitch in place for a moment, as livid puke goes, and feel quite unsure and disturbed about what could possibly be going on once more.

Soft _crunch_es signal the fall on cushioned grass: our final departure to our team's grounds. Spluttering the green flecks, Zoey mumbles, "Whuzzat for? Victin—F?"

Her name called, F darts up past us with a flurry of heat pelting past my face. Velvety ears sticking like red arrows in the air, her cloudy blue eyes widen: "Oh gawsh everyone's already gone. Gawwsh... gawshgawshgawshgawsh... bad bad bad badbadbad. Okay now we _move. Like, moooooooove."_

"What?" squeaks Jen.

The flicker of a green spine just over my line of amber vision reveals that, in fact, a winded chespin has found himself into our ensemble of broken pokemon. I notice, with a pinch in my gut, that no midnight, smoky pelt has fallen amongst us: Tim is devoid of our home. I'm safe; Zoey's safe; we'll live until I can catch Burr or Mina and request for both to listen to my pleas.

"Like, move, stupids!"

"Whyyyyyyyy?" groan Zoey and Jen in tandem. A squeak that could have meant to be a chortle arises from the beige-and-mint coat beside me, but Roland stifles it himself. How... cute of his reaction. Hearing this, even the slightest, the cyan hide beside me with her feet wriggling in the air bursts in fits and giggles—the naïve oshawott at my head groans louder; she dislikes what she sniffs out as a scene of... love? Romance?

My dear best friend quite dislikes most displays—but she laughed and enjoyed when I eventually caved and found myself... loving Elijah. Perchance because she was the first one to attempt and induce me into any sort of feelings in the first place? Without the saltwater girl, I may never have realized how I felt...

And Tim may have never seen such or killed him—though a hole in my heart winces in belief that he knew, he knew, he knew.

"Gawsh, get up!"

"Whyyyy!" Zoey squeals. Her voice propels her on: louder, louder, louder. Long, navy blue ears flop pathetically by my own slits.

The cloudy blue orbs narrow. "It's important!"

"What is?"

"You coming!"

"Whyyyyyyy?"

A stifled retort; anger sizzles in F's throat. "BECAUSE ESPA AND UMBRE ARE HAVING LIKE A BABY AND THE EXPEDITIONS ARE ALMOST READY!" She clears her smoking throat, coughs up a stray spark. "Gawsh." The victini fluffs a patch of cream fur on her cheek and beckons with the spicy, red fingernails.

With a sudden, new rush of obedience, my limpid friends pull themselves into a suitable moving fashion and stumble past the victini. Giggling, her long ears shivering with fleeting dewdrops, Zoey's fingers pluck and pull me from the imprinted grasses behind—cold,wet fingers tear into my own coldblooded ones and we shiver in harmony. I toss my pointed head back to where our bodies landed and wince at nature's hit: painfully obvious where we fell and got back up. "Oh, come on, Llana! It's not that..." Turning her circular white face back, Zoey's expression lights up and she exchanges a glance with me. "And now we stop looking backwards." She propels us on.

Down a leaf-touched lane, straight past our hillock of a wooden home, further into rows of long, grassy fronds that lead to a water-touched bank and to a small island surrounded by foot-deep sky blue waves, there the felines lie. Quietly. In wait. Their eyes light with identical bemusement at the throng of a crowd F has gathered. Already sitting at the watery tips of the bank are the yellow-scaled and winged Bay, quickly joined by Jen and an awkwardly-slinking chespin; the elegantly-poised Vivi—effulgent at best and divine only; a giggling mass of brown furs attached to another mass of yellow-and-pink coloring: Burr and Mina; and even the blue hide of Quagsire has joined: albeit without the swanna usually flitted by him.

"Quagsire! Virizion—no, Vivi! And Burr and even ew he's kissing Mina! And Baayyyy! AAAhhhahhh... I missed y'aallll!" Zoey wipes a wet hand over my yellow shoulder with what may be snot. My heart heavily tips—an ache for her. If I was trapped in her saltwater fur and stuffed into the nameless black-forested Mystery Dungeon with only Tim stabbing me with each breath to keep me going...  
and none of these beautiful souls alongside me—save a missing braided bagon...

I squeak, stumble back. Without Zoey, it would be as well; and although Tim would rather sink what I believe to be lips rather than teeth into my neck, the situation rushes chills through my veins and a jolt in my heart reveals that I do know. I do understand.

"Llana?" Worry from the river-blue eyes pours into me.

With a light shake, I mumble, "Are you okay?"

"Yes, Llana." The brightness returns to her irises, like a secret ring to the galaxy in her little orbs. "I'm okay. I've told you this. I'm okay. I know that for you, you really take things to heart and react really strongly but... I'm fine." A sure nod. "I'm fine. I promise I'm fine. You're here and we're both okay, and they're here to and he... he isn't. And that's all I could care for." Her white paws wrap themselves around my tiny spine and she plows her snowball head into my grass frond one. "Promise."

"Promise," I echo softly. My regal tone only strengthens the voice within.

A giggle. "Yeah, now we're all girly and sharing secrets."

"I love you, Zoey."

"Love ya, Llana! Just don't kiss me cuz I don't like romance and I don't like no one like that!" At her words, my mind pangs back to when she'd told me about her best friend before he died and she met me: that aipom, the purple furred anthropoid not unlike Ember and Cheeka, Acorn. From her description of the hand-tailed biped, my heart thuds as is he'd once felt such emotions for her—prior to his death—emotions that he never received the chance to explain.

Then Acorn was killed by a pokemon—oh, how heartless most creatures used to be here—and Zoey was alone without her best friend.

The words never found themselves uttered: they were dead, too. Everything was dead betwixt them, or whatever Acorn held out for the blunt oshawott. My heart aches for the poor boy—aches in thought of my own dear Elijah, may the duo rest in peace together: of an understanding, of peace to my own, as well.

"Oh..! Gee..! I didn't expect so many of our friends to just collide like that right there!" squeaks Espa. Her knowledgeable tone drops an octave, shy of a retort other than anything. But with the pinch in voice, the espeon only sounds afraid, surprised. Which is what I assume she'd be—did Elijah live longer... did he and I have... have a...

Nonetheless, I deliberate through a red-faced splutter, that the awkward, precarious position my dear friend perches in is one I'd rather not replace her with.

"Umbre, did you tell them each to show up on their own will?"

He chortles softly beside her, his wide scarlet orbs filled to the brim by mirth. "Maybe. Maybe a little," goes his swaying, almost as if dancing murmur.

"And the legend? To call everyone here? To force us to be bombarded this way?"

"Geez, Luna, I thought these were your friends!" His eyes twinkle at using her old name.

The lilac fur in Espa's cheeks only twitch, then stain themselves red like wetting with berry juices. "Sh-shut up, Kinks!"

He giggles a childish tune. "Luuu-naaa! Luuu-naaaa! How-I love-you soooooooo!"

"Kinks, stop it already! You're going to dye me red!"

"I love you, though~ It's my job."

"Kinks!"

"Luuu-naaaa~!"

"K-kinks!" But by then the midnight furred mate smooths himself as well as the mate in question's fur, a teasing smirk tied along his only gently-shining dark pelt. Planting a kiss on the lilac furred espeon's forehead, Umbre mutters a new tune under his breath and heavily plops himself down on the island surrounded by foot-deep waters. "It's very important today, isn't it dear? May as well tell all of our buddies?"

She doesn't even bother tossing his old name out. Hearing the words jump back and forth, I soon find humor in the fact that Espa was expected as an umbreon—thus the midnight name of Luna—and Umbre himself seemed to only be cut off as unusual, flawed, and a simple misfit: thus dubbed Kinks. And now in spite of their pasts, the nicknames of their own species names have suited their well-beings now. Honestly, I feel the duo could call one another whatever words they wanted, and their friends—us—would follow; just by the bountiful love stringing each name whole.

"Um, hello, friends and chaps and the like—!" splutters the espeon. The ruby on her forehead splutters as well like another eye, this one sensing the tensity of so many eyes following one little Espa in comparison. "Umbre wanted... yes... you all to be known that we just realized I am most definitely holding the makings of a... of... um..."

Even with her endless sources of observation and knowledge, Espa cannot bother mumble where she has come in life. "Her belly is going to swollen up and produce a child," helps the reason said child will produce at all, the tune under his lip returning.

A squawk. "Umbre!"

"Well yeah, it's true. Don't worry—you're not ugly, you're adorable."

"A-ah!" She shakes herself. "N-never... never mind that. Or him. Or either of us, for that matter. So yes... Iamhavingababy... and it will surely take a time prior to its coming but... it is. It very well quite is. So um yes I actually do love Umbre as downright annoying as he is..."

"Love ya, babe!"

"And um either way... our new Paradise planted on the remains of the Glacial Palace—hopes for connecting with even more creatures through our Hope and, well, Llana, basically—shall be starting up soon, I should think. Our secure sort of portal should be finished soon." With a cute smile to end the deal, Espa angrily flops on the grassy island beside her mate and butts her head at him with a slight grunt.

Further off, though still quite beside Zoey and myself, Vivi giggles as well. Her gently violet orbs seem to stroke the duo as she watches them, smiling and tittering to herself. "They're so sweet on each other, no?" she murmurs. "It's... nice, to see that we still have these basic needs of life: of love and children and others of the sort. I trust these basic needs one day waken Kyo from his stupor." Her smile, though situated with a burst of pride, appears so lonely, so sad, sitting there on her cream-colored cheeks.

Even as of now, the virizion in front of me is the only creature I've ever seen call Kyo by name at any given time or place and never see herself struck down from it. I do recall—from back to when Vivi first introduced the capricorn—that she warned us to not call the keldeo aloud by name unless in direct address for him because it seems to unnerve his already unnerved stature.

She deserves so much from that small, cream-colored legend, and yet receives nothing but still silence. She deserves his love and joy to blossom and spill all over her, and yet nothing happens. Virizion deserves to find such joys in her life and yet staples herself with an immortal that could so easily lose his mind and die at any given moment.

She deserves so much better. And yet here she is. How odd is fate, twisting and cutting such grueling marks on the kindest cheeks?

Like Vivi?  
Like Vivi—oh yes, like the poor dear legend, her elegantly-poised stature only cloaking so much hidden fears and sorrows; her curves horns shadowing over a tear-stained expression with deep, dark, sad, purple eyes; and she deserves such a kind, sweet, considerate, strong, passionate—practically perfect counterpart to love her.

If there is anything at all Kyo could do; he has to waken himself to life again: for Vivi. For the female losing and feeling and drowning in pain for him. And never letting go; never giving up.

With a respectful nod, deep and uplifting and powerful between the grassy-grown virizion and myself, leaving Zoey to totter behind and chatter with her reunited friends—what appears to be Bay first and foremost and my heart gives a twinge in thought of the lithe dunsparce—I pad on. My route takes me over the shallow waves and unto the island where a seething lilac-colored feline and her smirking mate lie.

"Espa." Her smothering, overprotective nature springs as her forked tail wraps about my own and draws me in, and those deep light violet orbs wash me over—a mothering personality: perfect for a mother-to-be. Perfect for whom Espa shall be, given time and patience.

A pliable grin, but a grin nonetheless. "Llana, dear, indeed. How nice it is to see you! You have been missing for a patch of time when you dispersed off in search of Zoey—as did Tim too. It appears... he's not here."

The entire clearing has seemed to breath in new, strengthening breaths of air at the sight that the smoky timburr hasn't arrived as of yet—wherever he is now, now doesn't wrap about here like it does for our dear little crusade of characters tied close to my heart.

Though whether or not Tim himself counts is a mystery.

"That's—that's so wonderful! You and Umbre, bound together by love, creating a child in such name..." I admit, my eyes grow slightly moist and my heart grows in warmth—humidity, perchance.

Someone nearby offers a flash of white teeth over black canvas. "Why, thank you, Llana. I know I'm not the most fatherly type—and just look at my dearie here—but it does make me very happy, very proud, to know this fine lady is going to make us some parents. Quite proud, may I tack on there. Also it'll distract her from—you know—smothering you, eh?" He cocks his angular head to the side with a chortle much unlike the cool, stoic, stereotypical umbreon. "Yes indeed; indubitably."

"Yes; indubitably," mumbles his lilac mate, almost out of breath as if imagining the child churning in place and taking up space and love and life inside of her belly somewhere.

He blinks his scarlet eyes in response. "A little tired from it, it seems." He titters cheerfully. "I love you, Espa!"

Espa mutters something incoherent that shoots stars into Umbre's already-speckled gaze.

"It appears I... best be off. Leave you alone as long as you can handle it."

Upon my humble bow and movement away, the reboot of chatter continues sets the mates. I catch words like juicy morsels of berry just on the top of my tongue: "I didn't agree with this" and "how adorable!" and "good idea, good idea" and "parents! Oh, geez!" The final rather plugs a laugh from my maw. And I trust my dear friends; age isn't a deciding matter in whom you wish to spend the rest of your domestic life with. I want Espa and Umbre—dear friends as they are—to be with me—with us—as long as I can stand it and longer, even, much longer.

Finally, I come upon the other bank of the waters and shake off small, unimportant dewdrops from my pale feet. My eyes lock with the cool gray stone orbs of Burr's, fastened below with an aloof grin; and the harsh magenta of his girlfriend Mina's as well. Sometimes—quite idly—I imagine whether the duo will plan themselves to be official mates soon or if they don't know or how to explain such feelings lodged in their throats.

Knowing the fiery mienfoo and comedic timburr, did one another not compete and know it, they would have already broken apart. From what I assume feels reasonable purely.

"Er... Burr?" I think of tapping the brown one's shoulder, but his eyes train on me. That beam flickers out like the sun before overlapping rows of clouds. "I wanted to ask about... Zoey..."

"Oh, geez, she's been good, right?" comes the great, blunt response with a smack-to-the-face of meaning. His energy bounds off in waves.

"Yes yes. I just... it's... it's Tim. I know you contain an odd bond with him and seem in shape with a pleasing array of prowess to... entertain him."

A snort nearly cracks into my attempt of a calm composure: Tim does unnerve me. "Yeah, yeah—he's not real crazy. We're worried about him, but he'll be fine, and he'll worry about us, but almost all of us here are fine. Kinda some crazy I-guess-Tim's-okay loop or whatever, but he's not all that bad. I'm sure he'll show too."

"No, Burr." My blood boils; Zoey could be flashing in place now, on the line, about to drop, even as far as Tim truly is. "I... it's about Zoey as well. I don't want him near her—she doesn't realize what could be brewing above her head... dangerous conglomerates."

"Ah. Doesn't like her. You're worried." Burr absently nods, shares a powerful glance with his lingering girlfriend. "If ya want, we could sort of stick together—then go through Mystery Dungeons as a crazy pack? Tim can be kinda scary, but these sorta things could help convince you there's not much to worry about here. It's the good life—it's our life. Our lives. You know." Flourishing a smile like he would a rose, Burr's great fluffy, brown hand _fumps_ softly on top of my head and he pets me softly. "You think too much, dear friend." A soft chortle, like sunshine dappling over a river in early dawn. "We'll help you. Right, Mina?"

With a jab in her yellow ribs via his free hand, Mina's eyes light up. "Burr, I hear and see everything you're doing or just did, you know!" The slightly-riled mienfoo later smooths into a smile, though. "Course we can help. Burr and I are currently trying to get me more into fighting shape again after the bad scar on my spine took place—and I ran—and I lost my wonderful boyfriend and everyone else—and as follows. So... I'll see you around more, it seems." She flashes a bejeweled grin; this emotion pulsating inside of me feels as if her shining, white teeth really are pearls studded into her gem-like personality.

"Cool with ya, Burr?"

"I heard everything too, stupid!" He uses a harsh word, but the tone is soft and gently ensconces his listeners.

Mina scoffs—a mocking sort of call that would put a real angry retort to shame. "Uff! I didn't think you were that smart as it was! What do you want: a medal?"

The lovers continue play-fighting for a moment longer before one ends up rounding their fingers around the other's and my heart painfully jumps in my chest, a reminder to leave before any... anything ensues. With my escape comes the running over playful _splash, splashing_ waters and a catharsis of warm, cleansing emotions on the inside. I run into the oshawott bounding toward me and with her arms stringing into mine, we finish our shared stroll for Bay once more.

Sighting our turn, the dunsparce's yellow scaled face lights up.

**Yes. Bay is a good man.**

**Bay: Bay is a very good man.**

**Tim: Bay isn't quite as good as he thought.**

**Bay: Rude.**

**Me: Anyways. I dunno, I like Bay. His name, his cute self... it always makes me feel guilty when we see him and it's like right I killed his best friend Elijah awhile ago.  
Moving on... Burr and Mina! They in themselves have always been a plan I wanted to use. I like how I'm lying it here... Linking it in with another idea I've wanted to use of Espa and Umbre's baaabyyyyy. Now if it isn't obvious enough, I guess I could call them Luna and Kinks but I dunno. I kind of like Espa and Umbre. It's simple and cute and they purposely escaped those old names, so... uvu **


	11. To be Okay

Chapter 11: To be Okay

Shadows continue to streak down my line of sight, but at the same time I know that Tim hasn't shown for a small number of days and still has yet to reveal himself again. Either he's lurking out somewhere or perhaps lost in the black Mystery Dungeon or perhaps... holds another teammate prisoner. Even as Burr and Mina and Zoey and myself—the oshawott maybe slightly induced into the reasoning behind our bulky gang, that Tim is out for her—for me as well—step so calmly over cropped fields in the vast landscape painted red over the sunset overlooking each bit of Breezy Meadow.

I vaguely recall the name of the magical lands here—a lost scent of rain in parched desert, it seems; back when the great beartic Mist had lost her child, Chilly, that younger mammal still with the hulking stance but also a long line of ooze from his nose—snot. And they—Mist and her niece, Pinky—didn't know where he dispersed off to—later leading to our first meet with Espa and Umbre, who had also crossed paths with the naïve cubchoo—but had an idea he'd either scrounged around into a forest or meadow. Later, it was revealed the forest was his chosen spot to scrounge, not the meadow. And the meadow Bay, Jen, and... and also Elijah had scavenged in for the boy was Breezy Meadow. Here.

At first I didn't know what to think until memory after memory unfolded and drenched me with old emotions and thoughts and feelings: like rain dumping down on my head. My own personal storm. Even with sunlight dappling and warming our bulky group, I shiver.

Though as I lose the torpor, Burr's charming though off-key—as it always will be—singing seems to hug me close.

_Doo, dooo doooooooooo!  
Doooo, dooo dooooooo...  
__Duh duh duh, duh duh duh  
There's a castle in the sky  
Made of ice, hear me nice  
Watch it up and up and rise  
Lady Munaah will die  
In her castle in the sky  
Oh there's nothing up there  
Only dummies in the air!  
_

Other incoherent and incorrect words string to craft music, but I hum tirelessly in a doomed attempt to tune Burr's voice and soften his screechy blows for only a notch, a slight success when looked on favorably; and Mina sings as well. Her own words nearly never match with her boyfriend's, but eventually, with her magenta limbs swinging and yellow-as-the-sun chest and cheeks puffed out, toward the end of the song, sync is in reach: they begin to tread on each other's words and understand what the other was going for in music the entire time.

Zoey sometimes offers her voice, but mostly stays quiet with her river-blue eyes darting like stepping stones over the dusty path below. I squeeze her hand; she squeezes back.

Without even asking, without ever asking, the sweet soul understands we have a cloud following inside of us somewhere. Perchance even somewhere in that youthful mind of hers—I suppose all of our minds could be youthful, though not as much as the lithe little oshawott—ideas have clicked, the right ideas, and she sees Tim and his smoky face smirking down upon her. With his hand scraping over mine—? My heart jumps at the thought that Zoey could have seen that, could think... thoughts, dark and clumping together like sticky creepers the color of nightmares... and know well enough Tim could be hunting for her but he doesn't hunt... _for me. _More so holds that... strange... liking, is it?

If he is the Bittercold—and believes himself so—does that make it right for his attraction toward the Sweethot so strong? He tells me Darkie herself—the night spirit at her best—asked him to join her case first and he refused simply because she wished to kill me, and Tim strictly... forbids that.

Zoey, with her round, dark orbs, murmurs, "The monster in sight yet?" An outlaw, called to our attention by F a sunrise or so ago, has apparently taken refuge in this flat, vast area. The springy grass below doesn't feel bloodstained but untouched, rather, as if this was the last place any sort of anybody would go for a stroll or any of the sort. Especially not where the red-stained paws of a predator would roam and stain themselves anew.

Burr's deep, hearty tone breaks from singing for a mere moment to offer a chipper "nope!" prior to delving back in. Mina's voice continues along, escaping over a stanza, bypassing her boyfriend's voice with a quick singsong of words and sticking out her tongue when he roughly goes on in stumbling tone.

"Eh? Eh?" she goes, taunts playfully.

I like how the mienfoo has a bold, strong, sparkling attitude even with the scar more carving than brushing its way down her spine. Only glimpsing the crusted bit of work makes one wonder: how did one ever pertain to that scar—and live it up as well? She continues to act cocky, even with the awareness that someone could cut open that lip on her back quite simply. In my startled heart, I doubt I would attempt to slice her through—even if I could—but others may.

Not every single pokemon has turned around and brightened themselves just because I exist, just because I'm Sweethot. From my allot of knowledge, Tim must have brushed by swarms of more entities than I could ever hope to stumble upon. He still wins. There are still a multitude of black lights hanging in souls, black lights that I find my duty tending to be to clean such guck out.

We stroll on peacefully throughout the single or forked paths of Breezy Meadow; when one splits, Burr chooses the one he says his heart "just feels its righteousness" and that "this has to be the one—trust me, guys." The great stretch of land already is so barren and only filled with blankets of grasses that one could take the wrong trail and still pick out whatever outlaw it is in the distance of another path. I prefer, though, to let Burr's heart, as he calls these sensations, over anything else: these feelings also seem to have a lack of taking the shadowed path.

Seeing the ripples of darkness nearly touching our toes on the other trail chosen unanimously without voice to neglect, I only feel as if the warm whisper of Tim's breath has narrowly missed brushing upon me.

With him beside me, fear spikes for a sudden death; without him beside me, fear spikes for a drawn-out death. I continuously glance for my best friend and pray from the tips of my scales to the deepest deposits of marrow, from my everything, may she not drop dead.

I don't want any of the characters strolling alongside me to lose a life—lest of all be her. I purposely asked for my strongest and seemingly closest—to Tim—teammates I have, my dear friends that I know can assist in such form, in such way, to perhaps prevent any... of those unnecessary deaths, as he so bluntly labels them.

Unnecessary. Had they been so, Tim could surely find ways around murder; I would even opt for him kidnapping of me rather than to go and scoop the hearts and other inner organs of importance. Why he doesn't simply swoop out of the gloom and take me—I don't know. Tim has his reasons, reasons that he won't reveal from his shadow-enclosed perch. And my soul lets out a small sigh at each worry; a part of me wills him to stop lurking behind me while another ponders if dropping myself out of my teammates' grasps and letting the timburr take me is the liable answer.

As if sensing my cold, slimy discomfort, like divulging a fish from the outside, Mina's glittering coral eyes stick themselves into my core; her face melts into a sweet smile. "Calm, Llana. We're all fine—it's as Zoey always says, yes? Plus, I think there's the outlaw bum in the distance, thank goodness. We'll sock him good and round back." Burr must have sensed my cloud of serious—fear; worry; etcetera—because his voice drops to a slow, solemn octave as Mina speaks through.

_Don't... you... worry...  
About me  
We'll get back on our feet  
Don't... you... cry...  
About me  
I assure you I'm better than she  
__She who hurts  
Is the worst  
The worst—she who hurts  
But it  
Will be okay...  
__Don't.. you... fear..._

And again Burr sinks into high-pitched singsong storytelling again as if he hadn't felt my pain and sympathized with me prior.

"Yes, Burr." Sunny puffs of fur furl into a fist and smack him with a _fump_ on the shoulder. "We'll be okay."

His singing abruptly ends. "Ow, man. That actually hurt." The duo sends out bursts of giggles before the brown boyfriend continues on again. He doesn't ask for an apology: the careless pink-marked creature doesn't even bat a brown eye. Burr is much more relaxed than others I know: like me. Yes, like me. Indubitably.

As Mina's guess predicted, the shadow of a black-and-white striped creature crawling through the fronds and ferns further in front must be the outlaw we're searching for. All F warned about was "some zappy dude; big; lotta stripes;" and "no, like, color, because the poor soul's an idiot." The crude descriptions have been met as followed.

The singing softly slides into silence. "Okay, here's what we do—"

"Got it. You guys stand like idiots while I karate chop the zebstrika over there. Thanks, Burr!" Mina's words strike by like small swords of whispers, cutting into us as they follow. Kissing her hand and slapping—affectionately—his brown cheeks, she takes small, gentle steps into the fronds.

Burr grumbles under his breath, "Yeah maybe you're the one with the scar but I know how to be all soft in movement." And with a flourish of movement in the back of my eye, a sore spot closed up in my heart breathes again as Zoey takes a stand.

"No you don't." A hushed giggle.

"Good to know you're talkin'; bad to know you agree with my girlfriend." But he grins back, a great lopsided smirk nearly falling off his big, fluffy brown head. In that solemn little trill of his, he's right, has always been right: we will be okay. I need to learn how to drape those words like posters inside of me and see them every morning, every time I begin to feel trills of worry or fear and remember. It's all we can do is live on and find okays in the world.

Still, the shadows flicker aside like tongues. Still, my heart pinches together and holds its breath, even with Tim dispersed. Still, the fronds near the pathways that tread by me tickle and force me to tense up and skip backwards from it.

Zoey offers a grin and places her white fingers over my smaller green ones. We turn and watch, quiet in apprehension for Mina, as the fighting creature in question raises her sunny forearm and straightens it like stiff boards have morphed into her muscles and eradicate with a light hue of energy, one that jumps over her yellow fingers and slams into the zebstrika on full force in the small of its black and white back.

It crumples: clay in use of its new master. A flicker like a smile weaves under Mina's magenta eyes and she winks back. Hoisting her fingers, she wrestles herself underneath the large, slumped mass and tangles her fingers into its matted fur. Each motion holds a pace only chanting in her head, one carefully crafted to fit with the scar on her back and not cause any harm.

"She's been trying so hard to get this right." Burr's whisper beneath the corner of his mouth. His eyes, like windows, have misted over the slightest and only reflect the light in which he sees of his girlfriend. "She works so hard for it and acts like it's no big deal if she messes up or even now when she's finally got it under control but... wow. It's just too hard for me to not hopelessly love her. Like if I didn't want to. But I do.

"And she... she makes me so very freakin' happy, it's insane." A final smile—dazed, lazy, tipping over at the edges as if sinking into water—dresses Burr's lips as he chuckles softly to himself, to Mina. Zoey grumbles a few incoherent grunts that must correlate to her strong dislike of most romances, but otherwise doesn't respond. Her wet fingers scrabble for and squeeze mine.

Mina, tail held high in the air, begins the slow and methodical dragging of the outlaw back toward her awaiting friends. Maybe it's the licking shadows on the ground that spill closer—accidents just waiting to pour open on us—or the mesmerizing dance of dead electricity and patterns on the outlaw's fat flubs of skin, or maybe I'm simply overworked and afraid and need to stop.

But my head swims. Like I've fallen in a great lake. And hit my head on one of the stones at the bottom.

The world tips and sways in front of me. The slimy muck of white in my hand slips back and I slip forward and a pile of grit shimmers and shakes and cries and screams _before me like it wants me closer like I should come closer like I—_

I can't stop the struggle within. And something rips. Something bleeds. Red. Grit. A sneeze. My heart burns. Red burns. Colors swim—white and red and blue and pink, bright pink eyes like gems.

Ember, where did you—go? Cheeka—Cheeka. She slips; he slips. Stella, a great hulking mass, burns apart in place and slips out of my sight. My hands aren't strong enough or fast enough to grip much of anything and blood or tears or_ something streams out of my eyes and something pocked bulges inside of me and _dre_ams en_s_ue _bef_o_r_e me, a river of psychic pinks sucking me away._

_The raspy whisper of breath on the line grates inside of me, upending my innards and tearing through my mouth and nose and ears until each whisper envelops and crunches and flashes through the small slits that hear and feel each and every vibration. I cough; I cough; I cough. A choke. I cough. _

_Nobody answers but the voice drones: "Tim. You bastard, let her go."_

"_No." A chortle? A smirk? A snarl? Something guttural slinks, slimy and smelly, down my gut and bongs into a throbbing something. _

_Something._

_Flames flicker dangerously; dull pink orbs snap shut, an angry snatch closed. "Why?"  
_

"_You know Llana. It would be so easy to take her, then take you as you've already acquainted yourself here, then take more until it's only her and it's only Zoey. Then I can take Zoey. Then I can have—have—Llana."_

"_You can't have her," he spits back, "any of them. You know that well enough." Fire—dangerous flames—jump and smother. A hiss, a sizzle._

CRACK!

"_Ember." A simple asking that burns in my heart. Another noise springs out from the backgrounds and swings like a bat and whams into a stuffed object—stuffed with life and breath and how much longer will he be able to live like that?  
_

_Ember._

_Tim has a grasp on the psychic mutants now. I don't know where, unable to see through the pink clouds whistling and whirring betwixt, but he has Cheeka—wherever or however that refers to—and Ember lies in front of him. My breath squeezes in my chest; he'll just go for another one dear to me until he can break one open._

_Unless, of course, I can keep up. Unless, of course, I can stop him._

_Another pair of pink, gently chased by blue curls of hair, beams near me. "Llana," goes the soft cry, "you did come. You did show. We're... we're near you. Underneath you. Just... so close. Please... Ember doesn't like being saved, but we need you. You are our friend, you all are our friends, and your help is needed if we wish to return alive." _

_My mind reels. _

"_Cheeka—you sent me? Like Stella and those..."_

"_Yes, the other fluffy beings like her." Pale fingers protrude and gently trace over my chest: my heart. "I knew you would listen. You would hear. Now please... I'm afraid for our lives. Tim... looks ready to..."_

_She recognizes as well that a black power runs through his blood. "He'll harm us."_

_The cold-fingered psychic doesn't need to mumble another word through her soft-speaking lips. I understand enough. My blood boils on the inside; Tim, again, in his haughty attempts at taking a life. First Zoey, now Ember and Cheeka at risk._

_Or would it first be Elijah, who he succeeded in baiting to kill prior? No—I'd rather see his failed attempts than the one he wired up and set up to detonate himself, which it did so. The heart ticking from my chest to my veins clicks like its own extra bomb, and my head throbs on as well, this pain winding about through me, it cries out softly. _

_I... need... to stop Tim. I need to stop Tim. From hurting anyone—from hurting them. Especially not them. My heart runs about and scrabbles at my chest, so painfully obvious it wants out. It wants to feel Cheeka's hand above it._

"_Llana..."_

"_Cheeka. It'll... it'll be okay."_

_Her pause; cold breath washes upon me as she holds her own, slowly releasing it in one go. "I guess that's all it will ever be. Okay."_

_I recall in my head—she changes emotion easily. Still, the panpour squeezes softly over my chest and asks me a wordless question. I don't say anything, but I know that she's afraid as well. We each are. "I'll save you. It's my—it's my duty."_

_Her smile lights white over the pink before the world as I knew it releases me yet again. Nothing spins; nothing swirls; I only feel the cold air of t_he _world br_us_h_i_ng over _me.

"LLA—!" Whatever great cry nearly ripped from Zoey's lips: the cold stop of it all lurches quickly as she sees my eyes open. "A-Ah... okay... you're okay. You kind of swooned over and passed out for a little bit there. I was asking you quietly to wake up... but you wouldn't... so I was gonna yell but then your eyes popped open." Flustered, the oshawott's fingers tightly grip my yellow, curved shoulders as if trying to keep a memory alive and assists me to the ground. Random circles of grit throb on me: I notice the dots but not enough to care for the slight menace of pain.

The sky above bleeds red and slight strains of pink. The air smells hot and wet and afraid, like Cheeka's breath.

She blinks softly; blue on auburn. "Hey, you're all shaken up..."

"Where are Burr and Mina?" I mumble. Thank goodness, I note, that my voice didn't crack. I'm mostly unharmed and I wasn't gone from my mind for a long while. Only a moment where I brushed up upon Cheeka and Ember and... Tim and his whereabouts. _We're near you. Underneath you. _The words throb back as stars beneath the backdrop of a blank, black mind.

Zoey nods slightly. "They went on to drop off the outlaw. They looked like they needed a little—y'know—alone time without me calling them out, anyways. So I waited for you. Didn't take... that long. So that's good." A smile lights her face, just a little. She's alive and now she's worried for me.

"Underground. Nearby. Ember and Cheeka... they went missing and they're... there."

"Ah! My buddies! Evil Ember and Cute ol' Cheeka!" Of course the spunky, naïve water mammal hasn't seen the duo since her time out, possibly longer since I recall her disappearing before my visit with Ember in Mary's humble inn. She'll want to glance on the psychic faces again. Perchance we do not know the odd mutants as well as others, but enough history bleeds our paths through life as one.

Instead of our trip here, we flock for the darkness, jagged like stripes, arcing over the grass fronds and other plant matter below and amongst, for where lines like licks from Tim of Bittercold lead to the hillock jutting slightly above the usual grassy pains of Breezy Meadow. It's a simple trip down the tunnel jutting out and sucking in air like a maw from the earthen fields. And inside, eerie glows of pink traipse on the wall and alight upon our presence.

"Oh thank gosh they'll be okay."

"Yes," I murmur, "yes. We'll find them. We'll be okay; they'll be okay."

"Indubitably!" she squeals back in that saltwater accent. Zoey's fun, childish demeanor returns like a bubble hiding from the love blossomed betwixt Mina and Burr. She only dislikes the kindness behind it and notions and urges unearthed. She does, though, like Elijah—whether he's dead or not, he's liked. By her. By me. Perchance she only preferred when she chooses the matches herself, hand-picked from the wet, white fingers Zoey clutches to herself while smiling and giggling.

When we chance upon the miniature sort of Mystery Dungeon within the Mystery Dungeon already—an infinity contained within a larger confine of infinity—with its barren, brown walls and crumbly holes of patches, the sitting and waiting stares of a pair of pink-eyed psychics see us as well.

Tim cannot be found, except for the splotches of red footprints chasing the ground only slightly. Bruises—little damage to her blue and pale furs—sit like spots on Cheeka's shaking composure, but no cuts of blood pool out.

"Perchance we'll be okay a little longer," mumbles the blue-faced girl, and she jumps for us and tackles us and doesn't let go.

Ember, quieter, more weary, drained, afraid, tiptoes softer and only murmurs, "Llana. Zoey. So you did." But he's here as well.

Tim must have left because he knew I was alerted; this is the Sweethot's area now. There are stamps with my needs scattered upon my beloved friends' faces and forearms and other bits of body Tim can only glance at and know to step back, because I'm here.

One day perchance I will be able to turn joy from what he spins hate. I can only wait.

Okay... we're okay. We're all okay right now. My heart settles within my chest as it butts against Cheeka's, perhaps her own pale chest as well and she hides herself in me but we'll be okay. It's all we can do but be okay, but get better, and if we don't, we die and go somewhere better anyways.

We'll be okay.

**Mm... I did not expect such an oddly meaningful sort-of term to come from the whole okay thing, pbbt. Am enjoying writing this story a lot, and oh my gosh my summer is nearly here so that's awesome and I plan to write until I can hardly move from my cramped position, but... wait. No buts. I'm having fun. uvu**

**Tim: I am not having fun.**

**Me: Since when do you have fun anyways? You're always like grr grumpiness.**

**Tim: ...grr, grumpiness... -eyes narrow-**

**Me: So did you guess Ember and Cheeka would be in mortal danger since Zoey was gone then Zoey was in bad place, now Ember and Cheeka? No? Yes? Haaahh... we'll see how long this lasts, though... ewe**

**Tim: I plan to kill one of you fulsome pests soon enough.**

**Me: FOOPING TIM.**


	12. Stuck to Them

Chapter 12: Stuck to Them

_Wispy words stroke the slits provided as my ears: "You knoww, youuu knoooowwww, youuussss knowwwwsssssss... sssssss..." Hisses stream and sizzle, killing the echoes of Stella's intended meaning._

_If this is she. I believe the white, fluffy one intends to speak with me at this moment. The pink clouds encircling me—and the fluffy one's words—lazily prove I am, in fact, captured within a dream, and most likely do have linked acquaintance with my dear Stella. I want to believe such. She should be delivering... an odd sort of message, at this moment._

"_Scum."_

_The royal accent kicks in; yes, this is Stella. Who else calls the creature that desires me and the death of my friends: scum?  
_

"_Filthy, filthy scum, he is... no?"_

"_Stella... he's not too bad... is he?"_

_Violet orbs flash—poison quells in the hard pupils but it's as if a single stirring will set off the toxins within. The pacing of fluffy paws, the _fump, fump, fump _directs me to where the white-furred fluffy one must be pacing, pacing, pacing, painfully wishing, wishing, wishing: for a solution. "He wants to mark up every last friend of yours—ours—in crimson; no, he is too bad. And yet to kill him is to kill you for your opposites: urgggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhHHH!" Gnashed teeth; a guttural whisper, sharpening as the cry releases and surges on:_

"_You can use words to pillow up the blow, but I only will use those pillows—to suffocate him..." And a sigh, a lost in pace, in breath. "I want you safe, Llana."  
_

"_Oh..." My own whisper trembles weakly. Her royal accent dominates above me, but all I want is for my words to stand strong and hold up to the blustery fear from Stella herself. "Oh, Stella..." _

_Puffs of clouds scuff under fluffier toes. A new body draws out in the pink mist, quickly tipping Stella's pointed scales of dreamlike balance and forcing both the white fluffy one and her... friend... the small, green one with the pink eyes, into sight._

CREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

_Fingers drag. Lights flash. The pink clouds flicker dangerously—warning? Warning. Yes. My eyes bulge with a rush of what must be blood at high speeds, crashing through veins and shivering like slivers of ice have sifted beneath my layers of coldblooded scales._

"_Herb."_

"_S-sorry, Stella! You know how badly I wanted to meet Llana! Can't... can't I?"_

"_Her—"_

"_And then you've told me so much about her friends like Bay and Burr and... um... you know, that guy who—"_

"_Herb!" My fluffy quadruped's violet eyes flicker. "Please, my friend! Calm yourself!"_

"_E-eek!" The green one—like mint, like an herb, it must be meant as—flops down rather hardly on her rump, bright green tail sticking out with each of its fur practical spines to her cactus rear._

_The odd duo of females calms themselves; Stella's snowy furs smooth out and Herb's bright pink orbs as well simmer in an accepting silence: cool, like quartz. The pink pendant draped about her neck in the riveted shape of a leaf in its own dangles—like quartz, perchance. Stella's own purple crescent slice hangs though easily bombarded by her chest fur's avalanche of fluff. Sometimes I do forget the power bestowed upon her..._

_She coughs slightly. "Yes, Llana, this is... Herb. She will most indubitably never learn the capabilities of dream-speak as she has no one like you to connect with. Thus we had our interruption." Stella's orbs turn back toward the pink mist swarming. "I honestly could show myself, but I am... tired with the business that ails our small pack of celestial bodies, and I doubt this could ensue so strongly. But it did. I'm thankful for that."_

"_And I'm very thankful to finally know what the heck this Llana thing is anyways!"_

"_She's not a thing, Herb." Narrowed—teasingly narrowed—violet orbs cast shadow over Herb's frightful face. But the space of us, of fluffy ones and snivies, of the fluffy ones and the snivy, for Stella and Herb and Llana, fills both the misty setting and my heart with a hot cascade of mirth, a shower of water after a rough day at work over Paradise, as Gurdurr may call it. _

_I wish I knew his name. One day, perchance, he will open up and reveal the word; just as I cross my fingers and trust with the heaviness in my heart that dear Quagsire shall reveal himself to us as well. Oh, Quagsire; oh, Gurdurr..._

_Herb squeaks, "Oh my gosh! You can just see the emotion filling her up! She's got special others and special emotions to claim all for herself, that one. I just... I just feel it!"_

_"Mm-hmm." Stella nods in return. "There's a reason I call it Sweethot."  
_

"_Yes, it all makes so much more sense now!" Shorter—though hardly younger, it seems—Herb breaks off and sways in place, though still slumped in seating beside the cloud-like Stella. Her pearl pink eyes twinkle in the glimpsing of me. _

"_Not much more sense, but I suppose enough for your cloudy fluff brain, eh?"_

_The frolicking in mismatched, pink clouds abruptly ends. Herb's heavily-padded green paw slumps over and fails to swoop or cuff any of her larger friend's features. "Oh, hush!"_

"_I dunno, man. You sure act like it." The eyes in her white skull tip over and swirl._

_Herb's fur sticks up again: cactus formation ensued. "I do not! I know enough! It's just... very interesting... your workings here with the strangeness that is—what was it—Truught! Can I not be curious without your petty insults?" I notice now, that as Herbs huffs and puffs with her breathless sort of tone, dainty and unable to hold itself for a long while of speaking, Stella's lost her stress and tossed it aside like an old coat after rounds of shedding. She's renewed Stella's vigor, brought the white fluffy one back to life again. _

_Some creatures have such an ability like that, to sharpen and brighten their friends. Zoey—Zoey does this. Her forever reign of positivity and care over not only those tied to her list of friends but everyone, truly, this overall stick to others, like sap, like she's a great oak hanging in a forest of trees, her sweet sap binding the entire region as one: I love that._

_My best friend is someone I will never release of. That sap has trailed over my sticky, stubby fingers, and now I've been filled with the sweetness, and Zoey cannot escape me, even if the naïve oshawott tried._

_Another similarity, truly, between Stella and myself: that uplifting need stuck to a friend like Herb; like Zoey. Oh, like Zoey._

"_Ah... Llana, you look ready to topple over and snooze from ease. Though I suppose you already are—and still happen to be—committing to such, no?" _

"_Indubitably," is all I mumble. _

_Herb blinks the slightest at my acknowledgment. "Interesting word choice," she quips, then goes on to say, "does she have to leave soon, Stella?"_

"_Ahah... I suppose so. Goodbye, my dear Llana." Stella nods her head once, then faces me again and her violet orbs expunge the hard pits of toxic, revealing layer upon layer of pain and questioning and seethe: for Tim, for Tim, she hates Tim, she loves me. "Goodbye. I will see you again." It's not a suggestion; it's truth. I will, I'm sure, in my heart, no matter whatever becomes of me._

_A howl of a sigh dips from Herb's lips. "Awww... I'll have to meet up with you again, Llana, and learn about you more next time! It's a will-do, you'll see!" Stella mumbles something incoherent under her own lips as if to suggest the aforementioned was highly unlikely, but Herb's twisty little grin doesn't wither. _

_The dream capsizes like drowning in fluffy, pink waves that awash one back and forth, cradled within the care of Stella and her control, and to know it will be okay..._

_It will be okay..._

Shaking does happen to arouse me from the touch of the sea: a much ruder awakening, but wavy indeed. "Llllaaaaaanaaaaaaaaaaaa~! Come oooooonnnn! Geeeet uuuuuuuuupp, sleeeeeppyyyyheeeeaaaaaad! Ahaaah!" And a whirlpool of _shake _and _shake _and _shake _and _shake _kicks up in the confines of the tiny oak room with the wooden flooring, dappled with sunlight and warmth, to catch me as I fall from my bedding.

"I think we should seriously clean out our bedding and stuff and eat, just saying. There is definitely something hard, green, and sticky in my bed." The words _F _and _spit _bode painfully well in my head.

"F turned out to be sneaking naps in your bedding."

"Eeeeewwwwwwww! Her, of all pokemon? Ew, Llana, that's disgusting!" She flails in place and eventually crashes to the ground beside me. _WHURK! _The embodiment of fluff under layers of wet, salty waters, along with the flesh sewing Zoey together in the first place, announces its arrival. "Ow."

"Are you okay?"

Heavy breathing; Zoey pauses, for a moment, one that gnaws on the strings holding my own self in one as I silently wish for her to live. "Uh, yeah I'm fine. Maybe a little tiny tiny tiny bit bruised? Like barely? Just?"

"Just?" I echo—Zoey feels the unsureness of my voice and retaliates with, "just! Only just! But I'll live, my dear, I'll liiiiive!"

I want to question the truth in her statement but eventually deliberate against: did the oshawott truly sustain to injury, she wouldn't be squealing with that seawater accent at me. The boards creak beneath us; I smile and in the corner of my eye she smiles; wet waters dribbling from her fur strokes by my scaled side; I sneeze; she giggles. The chains of reaction clink in my head, from smiles and on, and I wonder how Tim must feel right now.

Apparently he still hasn't fulfilled his little vow: Zoey lives on. Her residue trickling down my pale green scales proves this. Maybe he was bluffing; maybe the black-furred monster didn't want to. A feeble lie, I know; he loathes Zoey and has already killed my old love, has already put out Elijah. I'm sure did this oshawott not mean any value whatsoever to me, did her fur be scrubbed of my fingerprints by time and us never to reach out and touch another again: red, her salty blood would rain.

He would not hesitate to murder this beaming child beside me, and this acknowledgment is a thick, coiled, sickly, juicy, poisoned hairball I choke on in the mucus of my throat. I gag on it every day. Stop it. Stop sharpening your claws for your next kill. Stop prancing like Zoey's life is yours to snip away.

Stop it, Tim.

"Aw, Llana! Your smile vanished..." Zoey doesn't say another word; her hand swishes through her excess of water on the ground and clutches mine with a _squirrchh. _

I repeat what I told Cheeka only prior: "It'll be okay, Zoey. It always will be."

The moment drags on: tantalizing; I'm struggling through a wordless desert of Zoey's unresponsive gestures and the sands only stretch on, and on, and the heat beats down on my back and words don't tumble out of my lips; water doesn't come tumbling down. "Mm. Maybe." She doesn't explain it, an acquiesce that ends stuffy. "Come on, let's get up. We gotta clean stuff up, no?" Either way, Zoey's wet, white fingers squeeze mine for good measure, which must be soaked as much as hers are.

That bolsters a smile on me. The lyrics in Burr's old song float inside of me at the acceptance, even a sliver of it: because all we can do is be okay. But right now I have Zoey here with me—every creature I could possible hope to hold here in this home, our Paradise, lives on now. We're each safe and sound in this snug haven, and I'm sure others will join us.

Everyone was a beginner at the beginning: even Quagsire, for an umpteen of years prior. Even Mary: quite the stretch connecting her start to today. Zoey and I fondled and planted the seed that bloomed into where we are, and what we have become: today. Not to the light of tomorrow, not from the shadows of yesterday: today.

Today Stella worries for me like the relative I've never had. Today Elijah must be watching over me in death. Today Cheeka and Ember have required rescue and found safety within us, from the frozen, enclosed corridors of the Glacial Palace, where bones rot to ice, or now, in a peaty pocket of Breezy Meadow.

Today, this is my life. Today, my friends follow me with their heads held high, their stances linked within and throughout.

"Okay?" murmurs Zoey. We use one another to propel ourselves off the wet, wooden planks that I've grown so fond of.

"Okay," goes my reply, and it's all we'll ever have. Okay.

But at the same time, it's all my short and sweet crusade will ever need.

Under the grumbles and grunts of Zoey staring at her bedding—scuffed and skimmed with an odd, green ooze that's dried over the hay in some patches—we take on the challenge crumpled about in front of us. Thankfully, no other leaks of snot penetrate our home; still Zoey demands, as I package barrels with accumulations of water to spill about the musty though homey chambers. We take turns sweeping the rather large, ovular structure of wood and sweet memories, ones that require another clean to provide sparkling, clear attention again.

The floors shine from wax; the hay stacks only ruffled the slightest to provide comfort; warm sunshine streaming about like outstretched hugs to warm the newly-lit chambers. The sun passes overhead as work is done, and it doesn't take long for the yellow ball to light its peak in its domain and begin spiraling back down to the other side.

I take this bright entity in as I hunch over at the foot of our home, carefully choosing and planting little seeds of flowers. Meadows to sprout and weave sweet patterns in front of Paradise's home. I enjoy the thought of such.

It is work, but it is also easy tasks back and forth throughout the home, ones that allow me to bump my best friend on the shoulder as she waddles past. The other entities that live with us are out and about, but they will see how we have spruced up our shared chambers. And they will smile, I quite imagine, after a long day of spelunking whatever has been needed as their spelunking goes in order to save other creatures like them—to capture other creatures roiling in filthy deeds—to challenge those who call themselves worthy enough to try and battle team Paradise: I must admit, we've never lost one of those, ignoring the one day Burr deliberated to craft a team and do one only to find himself lost in the Mystery Dungeon.

The tasks rather don't tire us, as they are only the easy tasks running alongside and simply recreating our chambers where they could use a little help here and there.

Once Zoey—slowly and fearfully, as if worried simple satisfaction will crumble the oak wood—announces that we've finished, our little duo lines their backs against a tall-backed tree and pulls out some berries from the cover of its branches: a rotund green with a stubby point at the top.

"Zoey, I thought you didn't like aspear berries," I murmur; and my royal accent happens to cloak the surprise well, "since they're so dour... and sour... and..."

"All a that! Mm-hmm! But, you know, you like them, so I don't really care." One large bite permeates her soft fruit's skin and a sticky, sweet juice trickles down her paw, mixing with the water already present.

Her face puckers up quickly: a bright white fruit losing its vim. "You don't have to, Zoe—"

"OhnoIgotthisyouwait." She bites down again; _thiiiip_; and again; _thiip_; and again and again and again; _thiiiiiip thip thiiiipp_; until she just pops the rest of the green, slimy rest in her mouth. "See?"

"Your eyes are squinted up! Don't cry, Zoey!"

She turns around; as if that will wipe away the sour tears streaming down her puckered up face. "I'm fiiiinee! It's okaaaay!"

Unfortunately, I don't know what else I can do but devour my own aspear berry. She already ate hers; she'll be waiting for me once the sourness wears off on her. My own face doesn't pinch or tingle in the slightest as the somewhat-sugared, puckered juices race down my throat with lumps of squishy green berry. I'm used to these, coming down a line of characters whose taste buds favor the sour: from my mother's side most definitely, as I recall my snivy uncle Gerald eating these and plopping one, wrinkled and old or slightly less patched, in my lap and telling at me to use it as energy.

_Thip thip thipthipthipthipthipthip. _Little reptilian—snivy—bites punch into the green, and sticky sweet fluids drape over my pale green fingers as well as hers did. As Zoey isn't watching still, I quickly place my fingers in front of my face and lick off the juices. She... doesn't need to see that.

A short pause after I'd finished my own fruit, Zoey turns round to reveal a slightly-teary white face: not puckered in the slightest, easily hiding the dour fruit she'd just eaten. "Told you!"

"Zoey..." And it's all I say. But my eyes hold fast over hers and we'll be okay.

"Well... it's a little late for Mystery Dungeons, and I know Tim could strike anytime so... uh... whaddaya wanna do?" Her head cocks to the side.

"I don't truly know. I want some way to be able to keep track of every one of our members, especially as we start out that new Paradise and other members will be missing from this one for multiple sunrises." They worry me; little stones rocking in my belly; they pain me. I don't want them to die. I don't want them to be hurt.

She blinks slowly; Zoey's thinking on my behalf. Thank you, sweet oshawott. "I can't really think of much yet, but I'm sure we'll come up with something—or someone! You never know!" Those river-blue eyes shine like stones in the waters. "We'll figure it out, either way. It's what we do!" And she adds a jump on at the end.

"Yes; thank you, Zoey."

"Indubitably!"

"For now... we try to figure something. Whenever we can though, I want to find us a plan to stabilize these pokemon. I love them." And she nods, because she loves them too. "And we don't want to lose them; they don't want to lose you; they don't want to lose me; we don't want to lose one another." More flurried nodding. "For now, how about we wait at the gates of Paradise, count off when the others begin trickling in?"

As much as I'd enjoy a peaceful though lithe stroll in a Mystery Dungeon with Zoey, the others call. And I want them more than a walk I can take any time. We need to find them each and all and keep... Tim out. It's a relief to have him gone, but yet it's not.

He could be hidden anywhere: the shadows, the trees, the backs of tall anythings could easily submerge his presence. And he won't kill me, but he'll kill them.

Don't kill them. You've already taken Elijah.

**Yep. Leaving on another sadness sort of end. ELIJAH. WHAI YOU DIE.**

**Elijah: Because you killed me!**

**Me: right, right. No IT'S BECAUSE YOU LOVE LLANA AND THEN TIM WAS ALL LIKE I DON'T THINK SO.**

**Elijah: -_- I doubt I could win an argument with someone this irrational.**

**Me: BUT IT'S CANON.**

**Elijah: But you're also irrational.**

**Me: -flicks him- Thank you for reading another installment of story. ^^ As you can all see, Tim is a big fat bum. But is he really? Is he actually really nice or is this Burr or... blehbleh. That was stupid. Have a great day. I'm out of school now, so you can expect this story to have a lot of new chapters popping up soon. uvu By the way, next chapter's the halfway point~**


	13. He Scoots Closer, Blockades Set in

Chapter 13: He Scoots Closer, Blockades Set in

Umbre is gone.

Last night every body littered within the closed confines of Paradise: I counted, I checked, Zoey double-checked, I convinced Bay to check again. Quagsire may had counted and named as well, for all I know—as a sort of literary leader in our group of Paradise, even if we can't call him by name still, the floppy water type cares for us: his heart is huge, bigger than we could wrap our minds around, I'm sure.

How can one love others so much when he already has a lover? Where does his deep care draw out from?—is there a source? Perchance not.

Either way, someone counted right, everyone counted right, every body was listed as here and the day after we would figure how to keep close check. Then the morning dawned and Espa woke up and her shadow-coated mate didn't wake up with her because he wasn't there in the first place.

Wasn't.

How does one: wasn't there? Disappear? Mix into mist and fog and—my friend is gone and no one can even distinguish how. Scarlet orbs peep out of no place. Umbre, the dear umbreon, simply is not found. And we each had counted and labeled him with his name the night prior, like packaging up my friends and settling down as an overprotective mother. But I'm not their mother; I'm the Sweethot, and my heart runs for these creatures.

And Umbre is missing.

Chanting and stomping, hissing and spitting and sticking up with clumps of angry hair, my friends need a plan. They have clenched toes and whispered howls that only fill the empty air with knowing that we need a plan to stop Tim. I already... we already...

knew.

But now is action; now the flames in front of us flicker to life, and the black smog of Bittercold and frigid fear and pain washes down. If we had known prior, would Elijah have lived? Would... would Lady Munaah have had a joyous life? Would Tim be vanquished, or locked up in a cold, dark chamber?—though I understand readily enough that these creatures pacing fearfully about me wouldn't try to sever that bloody connection and let both of us die.

"We need a pair of teams. Whatever we can get." Vivi's wise and not old but gentle, soft with long days that pile until they mesh into times that cannot be picked out: the tone rings out and cuts off the anxiety. This is our dear virizion; this is someone we know like one another and can trust. Yes; trust. Not like Tim surely no—but trust. "One will have to lead with F—our messenger, as we know—and scout out where Umbre and especially signs of Tim lie; the other holds themselves close to home and works with finding a safety. A way to prevent this—ever again—from happening. We already understood this had to happen soon: that is now. Now we need this.

"After he has been retrieved"—no room for doubt is left, and I smile softly—"we use our planned creatures, as discussed, Burr and Mina, with supplies from our eeveeloutions to set out the next Paradise. They will set down its workings and settle pokemon, from Post Town or wherever else planned from. Other creatures can move freely through once it is settled, and Burr and Mina will leave again as quickly as possible to recuperate and find themselves home again as needed.

A smile. "Though we do want to reinforce and grow our borders of this joy we share, I believe we all unanimously belong in this one."

Short bouts and cheers tangle together. Grins stretch like chains, linking us. These are my entities that I refuse to lose. We have our home here: and with one another. My eyes glaze over the different furs—and scales as well, just like me. How strange it is, to rely on so many entities yet find such peace, such love, from the group.

Every story is different in every life, and here in mine, this exists. Every morning, to every night, scrounging through the dark of the shadows and moon and back again. It's something I want so dearly: to keep these entities safe. Safe.

Groups shift into formation as Vivi's final breaths murmur out softly. Assurance, as we all need it. She hangs onto her own words as well—the grassy green legend in desperate hope one day her love will stir and hear her words, and wake himself again. And live.

I watch silently with that lazy beam drifting over my cheeks, a ray of sunlight streaked over my cloudy pale scales. I'm so light because of who I am; and of course the same is true for the smoke-stuffed timburr with his black orbs and the pulsating pink marks draping dangerously over his knees, the back of his head, his shoulders. It's easy to remember such striking marks when that character looks at your own pale yellow ones and... his smirk, his smirk that picks up your heart and crushes it against the ground and you don't even know why but fear lights a flame and you're being eaten alive and stop staring stop smirking.

Burr and Mina—the brownie and his sunlight-colored girlfriend with the sunset pink limbs as his markings go—sit aside. They will need the strength for what they will do soon, and they register this calmly. They will most surely rest, though leaven whomever stays and organizes however to keep others from getting lost: maybe a little.

Vivi, along with her other legend F, line up further back, closer to the gritty path leading out to the Mystery Dungeons. With a breathless farewell the rambunctious victini darts off with a streak of fire, and the left-behind grass type watches in purple eyes intently. Others begin to swarm up to her, first a pain-stricken Espa with her face painted a deep, scrunched violet and stiffened fur. The scarlet jewel on her forehead winks in and out of life. Of course, she has to go, even with the child inside of her: at its state, it hardly exists yet. Zoey plods with squishy toes behind. Jen and Roland—yes, he's become quickly accepted into our sweet team of dear creatures—join their confines.

Mary and Quagsire must be out, as they go. I know they stay linked to us, although. They have begun telling us of creatures from quite near to as-far-as-Great-Glacier that hear of us. And those pokemon are growing—and so is Post Town. Those old, sullen faces have begun to brighten.

What we're doing: it's changing expressions that puckered sour. It's... phenomenal. This change.

Feathers rustle to my side. "Llana, you've been assigned with me, and Ember and Cheeka." Yellow scales fleck to the side of my vision.

Bay. That kind but strange soul—a good strange. He strives so strongly to provide smiles for us, to give us reasons for our hearts to shine. And this only blooms to enormous swoons of length as Elijah has... left us. He's the emolga's closest friend. He is and he was, and he always will be. I am, and I was... something else: another importance, but a different importance.

I like Bay. I like how he stifles his own feelings and thrives as we do. From what I do know by Stella and her saying of how the Sweethot goes, should be, Bay seems like the character who would fit beside me. The dunsparce practically shines as a sun already, his own solar system of characters revolving—without realizing—about him.

In a way.

Then my eyes catch on pairs of pink and my team of other friends take off for the bright, early morning sun in the sky and it socks me in the chest: I've never waited like this. I'm always on the team that jumps to duty and acts, and does, and sticks to the skies above while the others follow behind, so important and so close but not there, not the primary focus.

I'm not the one with fate riding on my shoulders, charging into battle or fear and shoving it all aside, and saving... saving those characters. It was me when Zoey and I sprouted Paradise, it was me when Quagsire and Mary offered us first under their wing, it was me when Tim and Burr requested our assistance in saving Gurdurr from his own stocky, shadowed hate; when Vivi and Elijah and Bay first found us and struggled with their own separate problems, when Espa and Umbre found themselves chased by monsters from Lady Munaah and her ice soul from desperation as well, when we went to the Great Glacier once, again, when Lady Munaah screeched for my help and nearly killed Zoey and myself, when every character who was lost needed help.

Me.

And now I'm on the sidelines.

And now if my friends stumble back home with blood or dark pits of pain in their eyes, I couldn't have possibly lifted a finger to stop it: to repent the pain. It already happened, already struck. Nothing can be placed on my Hope shoulders that sustain all in stride and such insane smiles.

Something throbs inside of me; my heart wants to escape out my throat and join them. But I can't I can't; I push it back I can't. And it will be okay; I can rely on them like they did me. Memories hug me like cacti would. Their needles stay. And oh, do they itch.

Yet I do love my memories, I love the old reminders of who I am, what I've grown from. And I love the fond trickle of joy that spares itself evermore, even after my dear emolga—our only dead member—my... Elijah—died, and the melancholic line of prior.

And that moment his lips were still warm and they stroked mine and sometimes if I try hard enough, he's not painted red but he's yellow and white and black like he should and I'm not shaking or crying, and if there are tears it's joy. I like those... the greatest.

We let flowers of love bloom in the cracks of pain. I can love my teammates: there is a flood of happiness behind that simple word that describes each entity stapled to me.

And so, I allow the long, slithering reptile with his wings flitting just the slightest—which worry trails—to lead me, and we pick up the red and blue primates that are Ember and Cheeka, and we camp out in bright morning in the confines of the back chamber in our wooden home, which we all remember used to not hold Kyo and Vivi but the latter and Bay and Elijah.

And me, that one time, when I recovered from the momentum of time... and I just wanted to dawdle with that emolga.

"So. Plans?" starts the dunsparce once we're all thoroughly stretched out. This room, stitched over its wood now by mounds of soft hay, thus allowing the room to have nary a light, which is calming, provides comfort. "Er, ideas, I guess. I don't really have any yet. I'm quite the fluff-brain."

My mind reels back to Herb and Stella. My dear, white fluffy one had called the greener, smaller one that.

Ember quietly says, "Psychics. They can keep track of much more than you'd think on a daily basis. Of course, neither of us, though: Cheeka's powers are too much for even her to handle, and mine barely spark enough anywhere. But find a strong psychic, and they can keep tabs like the victini does."

He doesn't call her by her name. Perchance he doesn't agree with it; I wouldn't blame the serious pansear for his actions. He doesn't harm, but he has his own feelings on the inside, sometimes stronger there than thought. There is something going on the inside.

"Great! How do we find this psychic?"

"No idea," he finishes bluntly, dull pink orbs ebbing the slightest. He's not smirking, but seems bashful—ashamed that he doesn't know? That does sound like the fire anthropoid I've gotten acquitted with.

Cheeka's bright pink irises bulge. "Oh, there's this group of pokemon visiting Post Town! I recall... they're like Vivi in how they're searching for creatures like us, that Hope you have, Llana..." There have been an allot of pokemon, as I've heard, joining or at least brushing by the older, saddened town; though now joy cracks through its long-driven grief, starting all the way back when Mary introduced us so warily to the burly, muscled gurdurr and when we flipped him: to now. And the cracks are growing, blooming, in size and shape and power.

And now we have this group of pokemon ambling in that could be our savior to what we need, to the great need of this psychic or another creature of similar means: tabs being stuck onto our teammates of Paradise.

We're wandering into Hate and Bittercold as we step further from Paradise. And Tim can even wriggle with his nasty, bloodied, blackened body into our home and _steal a soul from our ranks. _Darkness pokes holes in us; but from his twisted—love-struck?—dawning upon him, there's light too. There's most indubitably—indubitably—streaks of Sweethot on the timburr.

Is there a way either of us could crack, or do we both just rub upon each other? No—no that could never be possible. He didn't rub up like this prior; there could be a way to subdue him, and there could be a way to... subdue me, however he roils in that thought. We're mutations, and we're unstable like hurricanes being held down by legends.

It's not going to work; we will _snap! _open. Somehow. One of us. And it could so easily effect the other.

As we set final arrangements to barge into the light creeping into Post Town and hastily force this group of pokemon to please help us with the punctured holes in our team from bloodstained Tim's fingers, Kyo stirs.

He's never stirred. But suddenly the pale face shakes wildly and snaps to existence, and the cobalt eyes brighten just a bare shade, and his long, gently waved locks of red and blue hair shift in a new light.

"Shadows." He speaks numbly: a voice that was once cheerful, invigorating, adventurous, jolly. Now hollow. But it's something.

"Do you... see... them?  
"They're everywhere.  
"Oh, yes, I know I do.  
"So well, so lividly. They won't go away.  
"They don't leave, you know.  
"They sit there in my sight and I think they laugh.  
"I hate them.  
"I hate them so much."

In that heart-stabbing moment I realize with a sudden loss of breath that a great humungous chunk of this keldeo has just whammed me in the chest with a pent-up bludgeon. My heart rattles; a catharsis of tears clots my throat.

I recall suddenly a moment Vivi had tried to correct us on her poor love and what's become of him, and we listened but fearfully, with crossed souls hoping he'll stop:

_Dearests... it's not that he's gone crazy—it's that he's gone through a lot of crazy things._

This unbelievable hunk of Kyo has knocked the air from my chest, and for a moment I wobble in place and suck in air.

He's starting up again, surely. And he has to.  
Vivi needs this capricorn so terribly much.

For a moment as Cheeka and Bay and Ember and I nod softly and leave the again-stilled keldeo to the quieting monsters inside of him, I allow myself to wonder: what if Vivi, the dear virizion, with Kyo, had switched places in the fates of life with myself and... Elijah. If that was me, caring and loving this creature who wouldn't respond to me though he once loved me so dearly...

Strings snap like twigs in my chest.

How does she do it? How can she bear that realization, dragging it as luggage as she glances repeatedly and continues to love someone who stays so... unresponsive to their mutual bond... How can she hold this in her heart without breaking down into less than nothing—into a countless pile of hopeless legend dust, and tears? And the tears that may shed down her cheeks when she hopes with all of her heart and more that he will return to her...

I nearly topple on the leisurely stroll pointed toward the wooden town just across the path leading for Mystery Dungeons, the one we're not taking but Vivi, and Zoey and Jen and Roland did just cover and further on. We only cross a small section. Somewhere behind us, Gurdurr must be sharing his final moments with his dear apprentices, the only that hadn't proved as rotten, Burr and Mina, before their trek to the next Paradise. Though it will be held to ours by those entercard portals... the journey could be long, could be lethal, one never knows.

Upon entering the sleepy, waking village of simple, wooden homes with flowers parting the way betwixt, we recognize faces just the slightest. I do recall a few shining eyes from when I first arrived to Post Town and those same eyes were dull; I could have scooped pebbles from the earth and stuck them into the holes in those creatures' heads and called them pupils. Such change sparks now, so brightly, so gently.

And we have caused this.

Heart held high, without truly thinking, I veer from my friends and trot into the rough, feathered side of a blue, monstrous bird.

"A-ah!" I bumble back into Cheeka, who recoils by instinctively wrapping her pale hands about me: "Eek!" Blue hair tumbles into my sight, blotting out the monster thing with water-colored strands.

The dark blue bird—easily swamping Cheeka and me with its shadow—raises a black underbelly and lowers a long neck to face us with beady eyes. A crown of white feathers flounces high and mighty on its head. "Who the heck are you?" A squawk: low pitch, breathy. "Pfft... nope. Wait. You there, yah, you have weird long hair... pink eyes... and then the scales over on you..." He begins a monotonous mutter under his bill.

"Um," is all I manage. As well as I go speaking to my team and small children, this monster—suited by size only as apparently he has at least the slightest brush up on manners—does not fit in either category.

He laughs: a high-pitched whistle through his bright yellow bill. "You are a hoot, girl!" I am? "Pah—I see it now. You're that girl the boss wants us to find. Wow, that took me forever. I am quite the idiot at times, I admit. Anyway, I'm America, a shiny braviary."

America... that's quite an intriguing name. "Um. Llana."

"And I'm—" Cheeka doesn't receive the chance to finish.

"Yeah, yeah. You're Llana, you're Cheeka, and"—the bill and crowned head pinpoint our other members, Ember and his fists flaring fires of anger smoldering and Bay with a dopey grin—"that's... Ember. And... Elijah?"

My small toes quickly collapse beneath me; I peel from Cheeka, who abruptly retorts, "Elijah's the emolga—he died for pokemon like you! That's Bay!"

"Gee, ladies, keep your cools! I don't know you guys like my boss does. We're a smaller rescue-ish team, you could say. He, though, he knows you all by heart I swear. He lives for the prospect of just being in the freaking holy presence of that collapsed snivy there."

Cheeka grumbles haughtily, still in tune with her annoyance, "Well, you did just call Bay the name of her dead boyfriend..."

"Aw, turd, I'm so sorry."

"It's fine." Ember's curt tone finishes the statement as he and Bay trot—the dunsparce rather slithers—over for us. "She'll be okay in a moment. It's how we... roll, I suppose." And he's correct; I do stumble to tottering feet as my lungs creak under the weight of breath. But I suppose... not everyone is as brushed on the information our apparently high and mighty team offers.

This is the group, I feel in my bones. There must be members of this team that can meld into ours, each of them, and there will be a way to hold them together to be able to hold us together. I hardy know these odd creatures and yet they'll provide such an asset to those I love. At the same time, a line further down inside of me suggests they will pave a new road for other characters in Paradise, perchance.

There can be such joys and peaces blooming outward from us, and though we're in the core... we don't have to force every entity into that hot seat. Already our team has been set together, tied as one from fate or chance, I don't know, but they're here now.

And this team... shall we really convince the group of members to join—though persuasion seems quite easy here—that we hardly know, though they seem to already look up to us... Tim. Tim can be once again forced back.

America the shiny—he doesn't shimmer, though he calls his blue feathers rare—soars into the air so that only his bright yellow talons drag over the ground, and recognizing this as our moment, on the verge of change, my friends—my beloved teammates—and I file along behind.

We soon meet a clustered amount of rather large pokemon—it seems each are in their evolved forms to some level, and quite powerful at that. The jumbled amount sits tiredly on a nearby hillock cascading over and on the territory of Post Town, hoisting the characters to a gentle view of Mary's lamplight inn just to the front and shouldered to the side. As the largest installment of Post Town, and the care given to it by the swanna and Quagsire as well, it demands attention and easily is rewarded.

Through the eventual tumble and toil through who could very well become our sidelong team members, I waddle into the midst of pokemon and begin to corner names and basic personalities:  
first sits neatly a proudly-pink and winged clefable smiling her wide cheeks and waving her fingers to me. Selvana reveals to be the bubbly and sharp-witted pink one.  
Leaning beside her, though with the flaming mane stretched out, sits another female, this lax rapidash responding to the name of Vina. Her flickering, fiery coat winks back at me.  
Further back, watching his troops wearily, is the boulder-hard aggron going by Blast. Simple, easy: Blast. He doesn't smile down upon me but his eyes glimmer slightly, coal dark orbs that seem to be tending a warmth within.  
A prim and proper—psychic—pruning his long, blue-hued furs with his purple orbs pinching angrily up at me from where he sits stretched out, reveals to be Talmon, a prideful meowstic who I doubt enjoys our company.  
Shier, eyes carefully and crafty, dodging her murky yellow from ours, stands tall and bashful and blue with thickly corded muscles: Relna. A golurk. Her muscles and tall—especially taller than a snivy like me—stance suggest I don't come closer, but the shy smile beckons on, friendly.

Finally, capping off as leader, a biped with rough, brown skin and oddly-padded accordion legs, introduces Brutus, who as a quick, flexible hitmonlee, happens to be the excited and cheerful leader of this odd ensemble of characters who all scare me with their big sizes and muscles. Cheeka, Ember, and Bay seem to agree. Their rows of eyes: dull pink, bright pink, cyan, suggest we don't scoot too close.

But I know these could be protectors of us. And I know these creatures must have hearts, to have followed out for us: for me. They know who I am, and they want to attach themselves for us, for me.

I also know with shame that I'll never remember any of these names off the top of my head. Only America, the blunt, shiny braviary, has a chance of sticking.

As predicted, and shared with great relief in our smaller eyes, Brutus the hitmonlee leader takes long moments gushing over our own team of Paradise and easily slides into agreement over sticking those tabs on us. On my beloved members, and they'll watch over us. The meowstic with the foreboding, purple orbs promises his psychic use, and some of the others ask about pertaining to guard-like statues, and America opts as a bird's-eye view sort of braviary.

It's hard to swallow how easily these characters decide to join us. I suppose... I am this Sweethot. I am Llana—this is who I am, and the future I'm building... my heart grins and warms me from within.

**Ah, yes, that's quite the team. Kudos to _Number 15 Ugxs Dark Destroyer_ for asking to use these OCs in my story! There are quite a few, but thank gosh Llana gets a chance to use these guys to help her. I mean... seriously. It's Tim. You can't be too careful.**

**Or careful.**

**It's scientifically impossible.**

**Umbre: yes agreed**

**Tim: shut up both of you**

**Me: I'd love to say this means Umbre is okay, but how many times does Elijah show up? I mean he died IN THE LAST STORY, so...**

**Elijah: -w-ll **


	14. Big Footsteps, Bigger Goodbyes

Chapter 14: Big Footsteps, Bigger Goodbyes

By the unanimous and most indubitably unexpected help of the rather large individuals we'd convinced to join us, once further settled into the confines of Paradise—Gurdurr now upholds the plan to build a covered walkway to a new wing of our home just for these new troops and whomever else will join them—the entirety of the fully-evolved creatures expands and fills our large plot of flowers and rejoice with the thumping footsteps of big creatures stumbling about.

_FUMP FUMP FUMP FUMP FUMP FUMP_

It continues in every which way. One moment the sea-blue golurk with her huge muscles and feet traipsing over plain, another chased by simply Blast the aggron with his metallic feel and silence, but the plodding of his feet can't be hidden. _BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM. _I'm not used to so many large entities—or large ones at all—roaming around, especially all at once.

The tumult of each cry and _THUMP _and _smack _and step bongs through my mind: exceeds expectations. "W-wow," titters Cheeka's whisper-soft voice, muffling over me as her body hugs me close. Bay has left with the leader—Brutus, I believe, the brown one—to discuss priorities and, as quickly as possible, pinpoint not only our rescue team currently out, but the one missing as well.

Umbre.

His swaying step continues to miss from here. But I see them as Kyo said he does: shadows. They swirl at the edges of my vision like I'd never imagined prior, leaping from hidden crevices and threatening to strangle me—is Tim one of them or am I slowly sinking into blind nothing? With a prick in my mind, I recall the burning warm arms wrapped about me. Cheeka is here with me.

"Wow..." I echo after another tremble of moments.

Ember, I believe, has roamed off to watch the primary roamers, to keep tabs on them as they keep tabs on our friends, and us, as well. His fiery frame sometimes steps into where I'm bluntly looking at, but he doesn't acknowledge us. I'm fine with that; Cheeka's fine with that. We're each okay, really, just a little startled, a little cold, a little scared.

I'm so terribly aware of the shadows that dance and sway and bubble from us now. How deadly they could be where their source is... who could be the cause of this. I need to take this in, I need to accept and notice this, feel the holes Tim has punctured into me and understand them. His Bittercold surely—yes—does, does exist, I know it. It's there. And we have to do something about it.

Somewhere inside of me, a voice obliges to this—and we are. Umbre... he was the final straw, with what must be the timburr ripping into our home and stealing him away. It's... frightening, how easily I predict what the Bittercold will do next. That he'll come in and we need tabs on everyone and now I know, I know in a pit down to the very core of my heart that this is him.

It's frightening to be able to predict a monster's moves out like this, like we're all childrens' toys littered on the ground, and I know what that other young pokemon is going to do with Tim's piece, what he demands for. At the same time, I didn't know a precise according of what, but certainty that he will.

The monster haunts on; what could come next? Blood paints over my eyelids. Yes. That's what will come upon us. Cheeka feels my shaking and melds herself with me, her abnormal warmth from her psychic mutation just enough to cut away the frost inside of me.

"I've been on the run for a really long time after I was created... after Ember found me and all we could do was go. Go; go; go; to nowhere, no place to welcome us. Now that we have here... and you guys..." A watery sniffle cracks through. "I'm not letting go again. No way..."

"Cheeka—" I'm at a loss for words; how does one continue?

"I love being able to know there's others out there who care for us as much as we them! I love you guys, and you love me!" Her cry punctures the air and captures my heart in sudden flight. Such elation blooms and whirls within me. And I do care about her; and... to know that our rescue team can birth this joy for her, and for all of us...

My eyes blur. "Than-thank you... Cheeka..." Her smile grazes just past the side of my face; the slit for my ear tingles the slightest.

We stand there again silently, blown around by the air: but just enough that its coolness feels soft and gentle, not scary, or thunderous. I feel safe here, and I feel happy. My chest warms from the little piece inside of me that pumps this happiness throughout me. Cheeka's warm touch helps my coldblooded body in the cloudy winds about.

Cloudy. This day has taken a musty change for the... worse, would it be? Supposedly... indubitably. The morning sun, or however high it's swooned to now, ticking overhead with a spin, has sunk from view. No light but wind creaks out. _Whurrrrrrrrrrff... whhuuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrrfffff... whhUUURURRRRURRRRRRRRUURUURRRRRFFffffFff! _It seems to howl at us to go away.

We don't, either way.

The footsteps thunder clap, the wind banshee cries, but we don't move. Cheeka and myself, standing in the midst of what could result in turmoil or glory: only one way it will tip. I see how much trust and faith we've poured onto the shoulders—those shoulders—of these rather large pokemon. Ours don't hoist weight now that a ploy's spun to motion; but Vivi, and Espa, and Zoey and Jen and Roland will carry that same weight in pain and search for our dear, lost Umbre until he's recorded safe—bloody breath or claws don't taint him.

At some point in our shaded standing, with the shadows shamelessly covering us up, softer and fluffier feet scuff their way closer to us. "Hey, babe~" The natural goofiness in his voice is enough to provoke a smile: it's Burr.

"Dude, don't call her your babe—I'm your babe."

"I can call any girl I want babe, babe," he smoothly replies to who must be Mina.

A _whap! _"I. Am. Your. Girl. Friend. Burr."

A snigger in return. "That kinda hurt!"

"Well, if you're awake enough to feel it, you're awake enough to tell the difference between your babe and your lovely friends!" Then with a sudden motion of soft brown arms—laden strong enough to make them wavy with fur—Burr's hands cusp over Mina's soft yellow cheeks and chin and his lips connect with hers and Cheeka and I ditch eyesight, snapping the orbs shut.

For long moments, not a word utters.

Then a splutter. "Burr!"

"That, that is how you tell which one of these buddies are my girlfriend." And, as I didn't expect, the mienfoo doesn't respond or even huff a soft grunt of the sort—she simply goes quiet.

Until her glitzy, diamond-cut voice comes back. "You've worked on it... haven't you? You always were bad at pulling me into a kiss because it'd aggravate my back by one wrong tug... you've been figuring out how to..."

It's Burr's turn to stay solemn. The shorter panpour tied to me pinches one of my fingers, and I open my orbs as her bright pink shine once more into the gray day. "Yeah. I was."

"They're so sweet." Cheeka's whisper, hot and soft over the side of my head.

"Mina... did it work?"

"Um... yeah. It did." He doesn't whoop, doesn't celebrate, doesn't visibly show off his love or joy for the occasion, but I spot the warm, dark eyes in his face, and how much they twinkle now. How much happiness has strung and tuned his heart now, just from that simple moment. Sometimes there are even moments where this brown timburr feels a need to pull himself silent; and so does his chatty girlfriend. No words spill out, no voices bridge the gap between them, but arms reach out and fingers twist as one into a satisfying lump that must sprinkle warmth between them.

I kill the lights on thoughts of Elijah. I am happy for Burr and Mina—but it stirs in my heart, provokes thoughts on the emolga, and what I would do to replace Tim with him, to pretend the Bittercold timburr was someone else, someone I loved back so dearly.

"So anyways." Burr's other hand moves from his fluffy side and pats my head once, again, again, softly. His paw moves to Cheeka's head, gives a slight ruffle, then settles by his side again. "'Sup with you guys? I see a lot of fat pokemon have taken over—don't tell Gurdurr I said that—and it seems it's a little breezy... little loud. Mm. I don't think I've ever been in a situation like that, like, here, before. Funny."

My royal accent responds softly in tune, "Yes, indubitably, I've never been so close to all the noise."

"Haha, surprised you don't mind, since you're all Llana like that." I smile at his odd compliment: it's how Burr is, and I love him like so. "But I guess you like knowing they're working out of the good in their hearts, all so many, so maybe you don't mind."

His response plows thoughts into my head: "I suppose... I don't." Somehow my accent and voice float over the stomping of the others, those guards. Blast again rumbles by, the pink clefable with those sparkly pink wings—Selvana, I believe—skipping up beside him. His cold, steely appearance nary fits with hers, but somehow they gloat their friendship and it works.

"I can't believe that once Umbre returns"—again, doubt shamelessly avoided with a grin—"we'll be setting off and staking our boundary on old Great Glacier turf! Show Lady Munaah and Darkie and... all that." Mina leaves her words off there because we all see it, like heavy clouds just above our heads—literally, in this case as well—that she wasn't the cause of this: desperation ran like ice in her veins and Darkie, that black spirit with the taken souls weaved into her long, mournful white hair, Darkie made her into who she was when she died.

Can the darkrai return, though? Could she rebirth Munaah's fears and desperation and her, her in her own, and send the pastel colored chub down our path once more? She could, I feel no doubt; that she could.

_She's tried to spin her own lies about me, but such also includes my own killing of you: I plan to stray rather far away from that. You have quite the lovely head on your delicate shoulders._

Tim's words come tumbling back to me, strike me as I cling to Cheeka further and her fingers gently stroke over my scaled face. I'd rather not try to imagine what Darkie could be plotting just amongst the shadows littered throughout our small knot of characters. Burr, a lopsided smile dressing his brown cheeks loosely, goes on to say, "Yeah, but, like, you'll be going with me."

"Mm? What if I wanted to go with Llana instead of you, you loser?"

Burr coughs—a fake, teasing one. "Well, it looks like my pride's just taken a hit."

"Yep, it has. That is has." The lovers share a laugh, a glance: love must fill in those echoes of movement. It's sweet how one or the other can spout such words in a jive, and the other only giggles and eggs them on with their own. A teasing game, the duo dances. One I doubt I could ever stand to with another being—but how they glide through it...

_Skshh, skshh, _the slither of scales on land. Bright yellow twinkles in my sight, Bay's white wings flitting into my eye next. Burr and Mina turn to face him as he winds his way up to us over the shadowed ground. It slightly throws his drawn luminosity, but still the dunsparce shines; his cyan markings from the rims about his eyes to tail gleam the most curiously. "Hey, guys!" comes the chipper cry. "Brutus said he's just about done with some preparations, and I think Talmon's about ready with his psychic power!"

I nearly choke on the word "Talmon"—who is Talmon? I'd forgotten—until "psychic" joins its ranks: the meowstic. That bipedal feline with the blue fur and foreboding, purple eyes like he'd rather see our insides churn out.

"Wait who. Was it that rapidash? I swear she almost burnt me with that fire mane when she stalked by," Burr starts; then, "Wait. Wait! Why the heck are these guys here in the first place? What're they even doing? I'm so confused, man! Who's Brutus? Who's Tal-whatsit?"

Bay blinks. "Oh, right; you and Mina didn't hear. Forgot, sorry. Brutus is really browned hitmonlee and he's got a team of pokemon with him that'll help us keep tabs on everyone so we don't have to lose someone else after Umbre. We're like... carefully molding a safety in place. So that Tim can't get in."

They recognize these words: _So that Tim can't get in._

It echoes, bounces against us slightly. He won't he won't can't be able to get in here and taint another of the souls lined in our ranks with his Bittercold personality and his Hate and his darkness, if that's even the right word for it. Stars spin in my eyes; I recall when I first met the smoky dark timburr and how he'd looked at me quietly with a sort of mysterious curiosity, said it was fine I'd rammed into him. And I didn't know what feelings came cascading down inside of me... but the revelation in his action, that look of depravity draped over him, the blackness in what he was...

No.

Simply no.

_So that Tim can't get in so that Tim can't get in so that Tim can't get in _because now he can't pull off anything he can't. Simply no: we won't let him he can't. This group of pokemon individuals, each in their final evolution form with these strengths and great, vast body sizes have a system, and doubled unto us we'll be okay. Okay okay okay is all we can be.

Cheeka squeezes me from where her arms wrap and unravels herself, one hand straying by my side and nabbing my own. Long waves of blue hair fluff up by my side as the panpour leans closer to me. These are my entities, this is where I belong. A sudden trill of warmth creeps into my heart: yes, I belong here.

"So, uh, we going or..?"

"Oh yeah—yeah yeah. Yes. Sure." Burr's head bobbles up and down, almost a brown smear with the pink lines in the back of his head a blurred dot.

Mina adds, "I think we'll be okay without knowing anyone. Heck, I can't even remember the leader guy—that hitmonlee, right?—his name. Yeah—no. Nope. Completely forgot."

Bay tosses a cheerful grin. "It's Brutus! He really likes Paradise, so try to be on your best behavior."

"Bay, I am not a child!" goes the timburr, as he totters on and proceeds to step on something that makes him cry "Ow!"

Mina simply blinks, wickedly grins. "Hah. Guess that means I'm dating a child. What are the odds of that?" Even in the mix of shade and cloud above, I can easily watch the mienfoo's sunny, fluffy yellow arms raise up in a stretch and fold behind the back of her head, well out of the way of that scar scrawling over her spine.

"I am not a child, Mina! This really hurts though! What the heck did I step in?"

Eyes dull with tease, the glitzy girlfriend lazily slopes up to her boyfriend, yanks his foot from the ground, and inspects as the owner of such foot slides to the ground with an easygoing _whurmph. _"Mm. You have stepped on... a twig. Wow." A pluck, a toss of her hand, and it's gone.

"Ow," Burr mumbles again for good measure and pulls himself off the shaded earth. As he and his girlfriend loop a pair of arms and saunter up toward where Bay slithers proudly, Cheeka scoots another bit closer to me, her head nigh to colliding with mine.

Pink eyes, bright and fervid, sit above the words that fall from her lips: "The shadows... They're as K—er, he"—who feels threatened when we use his name, Cheeka narrowly missing that action—"described them, aren't they... it's like they're purposely getting worse, and they know it, and... they scare me too. I feel your fear as my own and wear it like your scales. Those shadows..."

"Yes, I know," I whisper, "oh I do."

The same names play games in my head:  
Tim  
Darkie  
Lady Munaah

His throbs; the other ladies lurk in shadows as if they're out there now, their backs poised against the blackness, poised to strike, ready to dive in and take out a limb, a heart, a life, anything. Anything, and they'll take what they can get; desperation is a powerful fool.

Further along, across our lovely home, stands tall Gurdurr's tent with its various grays and folds. Inside sits cross-legged the patchy brown of the hitmonlee leader—Brutus—and so does the meowstic whose name starts with a T, I know, but what letters and sounds follow falls into mismatched jargon. "Ah, I see you've arrived!" plows his excited squeak with a natural growl as I recall it. "Talmon"—there's the name—"and I have nigh finished recording our observations! Here's what we've found already..." He nudges the glowering feline and names spill out.

"Llana Cheeka Ember Bay." A flick, a moment of hesitation, more names not as close. "Mina"—who squeaks at her name—"Burr"—who nods slowly, smiling—"Gurdurr Ky—"

"Don't say it—" I whisper.

"I wasn't going to finish," interrupts the meowstic. For a full, shaking whisper of time his purple irises trace over my figure slowly, in a way that seems to invade on my every last scale; then they close and the names bubble onward: "Vivi F Zoey Jen Roland Espa..."

A pause. I want to faint in the anxiety, the tension I'm swimming in, my brain is losing itself in. "Umbre."

Our breaths fill up the tent with joy, with ease. He's truly okay.

"Tim."

The breaths edge over.

The purple eyes pop open.

Wide open.

"Unidentifiable entity. Black fills it, follows it. Disgusting. Cold."

The breaths lie limp on the ground and suck out of the tent. Our sunshine has been taken over by this "unidentifiable entity." What—what is? What is that?

"Honing for aforementioned names... which ones were—ah: Vivi F Zoey Jen Roland Espa. Especially... Umbre."

He's not dead but he's getting there.

"Tim seems to evade the cloud."

He's not dead but he's getting there.

"Tim seems able to walk through it at will. He seems in control of it; as well the temperatures severely drop to allow dew to form to ice in his wake. The ground behind him is red."

He's not dead but he's getting there.

Oh, we have to do something we have to go I can not can not—refuse—refuse to just sit here and listen to a monotonous feline spew out how long my dear Umbre has to live, this umbreon that I've loved him and his humor and Espa can't lose him. None of us can lose him. Vivi said to wait; she'd understand if we didn't.

This is the great grassy green virizion we speak of. She may even feel the grasses grow cold somewhere nearby. We cannot... stand here. And do nothing.

No.

"Come," whispers a voice in my head—in my ear, from Cheeka's warm, sugared breath. She disperses from the room, and I follow. Mina's and Burr's sad, sad eyes follow, wishing they could go but knowing they should stay; if everyone leaves, Paradise could be at stake; and there's their own trip.

Their time is coming.

Soon a streak of fire, of Ember, burns past, and then he's flitting by us and takes Cheeka's other flank. The slither of scales—Bay joining as well.

**Hwah, turns out Llana's needed anyways. xD **

**But I mean if one of your buddies, you learned, was about to get sucked into a death trap, and only you knew this, wouldn't you go too? Fun fact, when I first first created Fates through Sky's plot that long long time ago, I had plans that Umbre would get kidnapped. They were by different people, but yeah, he was going to get taken. I'd also planned he and Espa have baby, but not when we'd mention that, hweh. **

**Umbre: Am I dead?  
**

**Me: I dunno, are you?**

**Umbre: I dunno, so I'm asking you. I REALLY DON'T FEEL LIKE DYING.**

**Tim: enell **

**Me: So anyways, I'm just trying to imagine how big chapter 15 might get, heh... x3**


	15. Wavering on the Edges

Chapter 15: Wavering on the Edges

Our scuffed feet and undoubtedly tracked footsteps follow us as the trail leads on. Colors have varied as we move: from soft and pink to wet and blue to solid and gray to shifty and green. Strange—and awe striking as well—how each environment melded into Truught, from the Mystery Dungeons to actual, natural terrains, and how each variation sneaks into our homeland. I'd never thought this many attractions sat side by side and mixed together so colorfully to create one vast odd world. And this—this is my one vast odd world.

I catch a dull pink glimpse my way.

Our one vast odd world.

"D'you know where any of them are, guys?" murmurs Bay. His jolly appearance is kept up, even as we switch betwixt full-out sprinting and gentler, though brisk, walks. How he does it—I could never tell.

No one utters a response; I'm aware I don't even know where the others headed out—Vivi and F and her crew. Any information given prior was their names and the fact that F must have directed Vivi and our other friends to where Umbre was spotted—or signs of Tim.

He's not very neat at covering up his act. Then again, when was I?

A playful sigh from the dunsparce. "Yep, that's what I expected. Golly, you guys! Anyway... I'd asked Brutus prior, and he was kind enough to explain where Talmon had felt the auras and basic identity of our friends—both Umbre and our other rescue team. So, which one should we go to first?"

"Umbre." Each voice rings out.

"Hah, thought so. Just making sure!" His wings flick softly. "So anyways, we'll be headed off to... oh first of all we should hit a right here." We do. "We keep going this way until we get to somewhere... what was it, Foggy Forest?—oh, oh no, not that. Um... Fluffwood! That's it! So we head through there and we'll end up in an overlapping Mystery Dungeon, which is called something funny that I always remember, funnier than Fluffwood..."

Ember puffs a sigh with black smoke. "Funnier than that one?"

"Yup!" Bay's round head bobbles happily. "Sogwood Forest, that's the one!"

"When were there so many forests?" I mumble.

Bay, again, holds the answer, true and pure, with a jump and a flit of his cotton white wings: "Well, Truught has the Bitter Springs off in the other direction and everything—with all those forests. See, that's why we took the other pass, had to go through old Ragged Peak and all that. On the other path, the one I think we almost never take, there's more forests and stuff! I think it's connected to Inflora Forest as well somewhere—remember that one?" Again crisscrossing ways with the Mystery Dungeons that could have held Chilly, the little cubchoo. Breezy Meadow and Inflora Forest; and now we've been heading near that direction all this time.

"Okay, now we take a harder left."

And we do.

_Espa_

"Dear me, Vivi, are we any closer to where Umbre is?" I can't help it. I'm getting nervous; ticks and all the sort must look like they're eating me open from this wallowed up anxiety. I know that's what it feels like; surprising enough I work this well under stress, but I still feel the holes in my heart. When one's mate suddenly slips out from under their nose, they do not sit well. I am very well not sitting well at this very moment. To love a creature enough to wish to bear children with them—and then wake to see bloodied little paw prints on the ground that must be from the ravaged timburr boy—doesn't sit quite well, no indeed.

Oh no no I would rather quite not. "Vivi—?"

I knew her eyes would clash at mine, but I can't help it. "Espa, please calm yourself. He should be nearby—F's tracked him this far. The fact that she hasn't returned yet means she must be close on his trail..." With that legend nose hanging in the air so prim and proper, she may as well be a statuette of herself. I'd heard of pokemon in the ancient times that crafted little clay figurines of these creatures in the—of course—most poised position possible.

Honestly, I prefer seeing this virizion here in her most unruly poses. Makes me feel less slouched and disgusting next to her. Being so close to someone this regal can do that even to the most knowledgeable espeon: like me. Umbre would snort at that, but I need to stop flicking my mind on him and just focus on the task ahead: actually locking eyes with him and understanding, seeing, he'll be okay.

My peculiar-shaped nose twitches. Of course my friend notices. "Espa..."

"Vivi, it'll be okay! I know he's near!"

"Oh dear," she murmurs back.

"I'll be okay!" I'm yelling again—must be from that child inside of me.

Also I haven't been this far away from Umbre since that time we were running for our lives with those intriguing entercards from those vile enemies the Munaah'd sent after us. And before that, I hadn't been so far from him since prior to meeting him. Back when we were tiny eevees who didn't know which way the world turned or how disturbing my parents were, or how much I'd loathe being a killer umbreon.

Quite right it was to interlude fates with that oddball. Never knew it was possible to love someone that much; and it's an even greater beat in my heart chords to remember all of the different theories we'd created about Mystery Dungeons. At the time, as children, it'd only been a pastime to keep our boredom at bay as we ran for our lives—which is possible, especially as eevee kits the color of disrespectful mud blobs—but it's grown, it seems.

Umbre, don't you die on me—rascal! More and more the muscles in me cry out the further I go, stepping on what could be virtually any mix of herbs that I could label off the top of my head if I wasn't worrying so much about a dispersed umbreon whose flank I just want to cuddle into—an action I'd rather no one but we knew about, but my dear friends keep giving glances like there's a thundercloud the color of Umbre swamping me, because that's what it feels like when he's not around.

It's so dreadfully possible to miss another creature this much. And it hurts, too—a throbbing ache from head to toe, from the most significant to insignificant globule in my body: I miss the idiot umbreon with the bright scarlet eyes that hold so many bundles of thoughts I can never hold pace with; that swaying grin as he goes and tells me how much he loves me in front of how many friends I love dearly, but not like I love Umbre; even that flouncy step I swear will get him falling off a cliff.

Umbre: I already want you to call me out and force my face red so I can tell you off and you can confess and I can confess and we can kiss and cuddle—but I can't when you're gone like this.

How dearly my poor Vivi must feel when she glances at me and sees the same pain in her eyes reflected unto mine. That lad, that other poised and prim and proper legend who should be comforting her, he can't. And here I am now, and though I'd never admit it, the others give me those comforted, cushioned glances that spill of how much their worry goes, that they see me pacing and fearing for the loss of a life.

I'll wrangle that Tim's neck myself, first chance. My lilac paws can dye in blood for all I care; he can't just pluck that carefree umbreon away from me; does he even know how hard I try to keep the bumbling fool alive as it is?

One step after the other: wobbly knees, wobbly toes, my head wobbles over my shoulders. I try to find patterns in the clumps of grass swooning over our feet, but all I see are the shadows covering it. Why are there shadows all over the ground? Well, perhaps we are moving into stronger territory and it only makes sense that there would be different edges of grass with further bits of black edges in there—but, I mean, it seems a little excessive, as if dripping with fluid that shadows don't even contain.

"If we see him, I don't care what position he's in. I'm going at him."

Vivi chokes under a laugh. "I won't stop you, dear Espa, but I wouldn't expect someone as levelheaded as you to just run in like that."

I just snap back with, "Who are we looking for? I'd rather _not _go without seeing his face again! I'm going to find him and hang onto him! If that dratted Tim is hiding along the way, I'll just show him a thing or so!"

"You're going to make a strong mother one day," she purrs softly. That other pair of lilac orbs—the first being my own—seem to hold strong onto me. "I'll appreciate seeing you take that step, craft that change. And... you and Umbre get along so well..."

Still, a thought edges in me, we do bicker evenly. Though I guess no one's hurt by that. Some couples bicker is all. And it's usually because that sullen creature goes and yells at the top of his lungs how much he's in love with me—and it's sweet, I live to hear those words from his soft, swaying voice, and I like being able to run a conversation along after it and just provoke the words, hear him giggle, see our eyes connect, eventually let him lull me into saying it too.

I love you; I love you.

And I do. My heart swells upright open. Umbre, dear—Kinks, you sullen umbreon, whichever words please you the most—please show yourself.

Fate seems to have tied me into quite the predicament; when one loses sight of Umbre, I've never done well trying to find him. I recall not-so fond memories of little games like hide-and-seek with him and penultimately losing because how does someone find a tiny snitch like him? Fair enough—he's my height—but the kid could hide anywhere he deemed fit.

Sometimes I have dreams of that time he took off into some cornn berry field and I couldn't find him and gave up and called out for that brown rascal, but he couldn't hear me, I couldn't see him: it was a dance of the blind; the deaf.

And here I am again, with the same situation tying my paws tight closed. I'm slowly morphing into a sap from the inside out: before my very own eyes, as well, and I can't help but pour out thoughts of that pesky boy; I truly do miss him. My heart aches, cold, hard, tight—is this lovesick pain? It may as well be; I rather doubt I've gotten into a scuffle resulting any so mortal wounds.

"Vivi," I call, raising my voice, "I believe I smell Umbre!" It's a sudden jolt, but that gentle whiff of sweet flowers, mystery, the light of the moon, and something I couldn't ever identify mixes in my nose, which twitches upon recognizing the smell that nearly runs me over. And there goes that heart in my chest, without logic but need: a need for him.

Stop disappearing, Umbre! Stay put for once!

Please; let me catch my breath; let me stay here with you... It burns, a hole in my chest, as if I have sustained wounds when I haven't, and I'm turning sappy on the spot as if a tree's gone and rooted me down, and it's all because of that midnight-lit fur atop the heart of an Umbre, and the swaying step he walks in, and his mystic, scarlet eyes and: yes, it's everything about that boy. I've loved him for longer than I could even remember, to where memories begin to fuzz into bleak childhood, the brown runt's been dyed in there. Now it's tossed into my face. I've always despised whenever I did have to leave him behind...

"Are you sure? You could just sniff out your own tracks... as well, F pointed us straight on..."

My ears suddenly pan straight out, angrily stuck on their edges. "I do. I know I do. Can't I at least go?—I know I can smell his tracks to a right veering off of here!" My paws skid from under me; there we go: I'm pacing again.

We're supposed to stay close to one another, but if they don't want to follow behind me, I'll live; all my heart flits out for is him, anyway. It bashes an angry scar into my ribcage, most indubitably—now please stop staring at me like that, thine holy poised legend, before I just take off on my own.

She seems to sense something; enough, it is. Alas, her own love couldn't be here to share with her what emotions must be locked inside of me—legend let me go already. Finally that old, ripened voice spills out: "Espa, you're growing terse. You may be losing sense of direction or where he could be—please, calm yourself, dear, and—"

I know they're each here to be on my side and yet I storm back, and foliage of greens and other vibrant sorts stream past me as my lilac pads go pitter-patter on the earthen soil. Breath steams and the outskirts of whatever forsaken Mystery Dungeon we've stumbled into now steams as well, and the grasses fill with bright, soft purples that cushion me, the trees light and willowy and prettily matching: but they don't suit me. Only one creature suits me and his trail situates closely to me.

Like what must only result as a blind, wallowing, stumbling fool, I traipse through and through without even checking for signs of that wretched timburr the color of what could only Bittercold—only that sweet, flowery scent aids me. But that's all I could care for; his fragrance fills me whole and tugs me onward; the others can scramble where they see fit. I must find Umbre.

Sometimes, bumbling about results in bumbling about. Others, in turn, reveal hidden secrets, passages, each of the like. The bumbling of my life—and his as well—lead us here, to this road we imprint through fate as one, one now. There is no way I'm letting my closest friends stop me, even, from this bumbling. Because I feel it—I feel Umbre must be loitering about here somewhere. That dark type scoundrel's heart beats for me just as I him.

My soul practically screams out for him from the inside of me out. It's those instincts again, pouring out of me, that desperate need to lock eyes with those scarlet, that burning hole in my heart eating me up. I hate this. I hate having to spend even moments away from that childish grin and wispy laugh, and the inscrutable eyes that hold too many thoughts to be shared aloud with anyone but me. I miss nights where we'd end up talking the dark to dawn; building up our plans for this entercards that were just silly games to keep our childish minds occupied; all resting on my shoulders now, down to this moment—

"Umbre, show yourself al... al...ready..." The cough crusts out of my throat; I don't know how it finds itself out. "Ahh, I... dislike this! This running to catch you! Stop getting lost! Please!" I've noticed since that time we were chased by the fat, disgusting purugly and her toxicroak amphibian friend, each with their disturbing hues of purple, whenever I'm alone like this, without Umbre, I speak with open air.

It's possible to get that close to someone and I feel ready to topple over lopsided because his shadowed self isn't sashaying along beside me, or whatever weird walk is on his mind now. My feet go pitter-patter evermore over ground lapped up by this darkness. My fur sticks up, but I can't tell if this surge of rush is from adrenaline or colder, higher pressurized air. One or the other, either way—I just happen to know these sorts of things: but what's the use of knowing them when there's no Umbre to share such useless addles with? I have none, in the least.

And so I continue running at breakneck pace with my pelt on fire until a great monsoon—not even a cloud but full-blown air-stealing monsoon—of this great, black cloud just spewing flecks of ice and cold and that's not adrenaline but ice puffing up the lilac furs now. I stutter back, don't quite run into it, thankfully, and turn back. Breaths pool about me. "Umbre; Umbre! Where are you!"

No answer, as I'd expected, but my nose still fills out the gentle whisper of his scent, and I know he's just nary of grazed the storm here. While I sit so impatiently, the monsoon of ice and bleak darkness and sudden, thrashing claps of thunder grows restless, and when my pupils squint close it's almost as if that atrocity is floating on its own. Backward—no not quite—sideways, yes—to a slight drift of a left, maybe somewhat backpedaling as well.

Of course, I lift that dark violet nose into the air, and Umbre comes awash to it from the same general direction.

"How dandy," is all I mumble, but I must spring back into action—I won't let that scallywag escape me anytime soon.

Umbre is mine, and I am his. If he loses his life here, everything I've ever had will be tainted in blood and I may as well go down too. If Tim gets those gritty claws out, I'll push my dear umbreon from his path and take the blow myself if the need be. _Pitter-patter, pitter-patter, _the pads under my overworked toes go. But I won't dare stop this flight—I can nary feel the tire sneaking up to me, and I won't let it drivel any closer—not until who's mine has been returned safely.

The air stirring outward from my lips grows taut, shaky. Coughs regularly break my pace; my spirit can't go down lest Umbre—Kinks—whatever he wants does first. Whether or not he feels the same isn't important at the moment, though I know he does; that dratted umbreon is keeping his stupid soul on the earthen ground, yes. I'll make sure it happens.

And then I given an unruly _screeeeeeek: _a collapse under a slip of blood. The pads under my feet, now stained like one side or another of my flank, jump right back up, no excuses, Umbre's not safe.

He's getting nearer; I can just about feel the sweet, flowery breath washing over me. I take almost a flouncy step, heart beating softly inside, clapping with a quiet pride. "Umbre!"

A voice shoots back, but I don't catch its words. "Umbre, I'm over here!" goes my snappy-though-sweet reply as I knew it would. "Where are you? Where did you go! I'm right here, Umbre! Please come find m—_EE!"_

Hot—bleeding hot, cursedly steaming—paws of hands clap over my maw. A deep chortle rumbles by my frigid ear: "Espa. How nice of you to join me, now that my first captive's gone and... escaped."

Umbre... is safe.  
Umbre escaped.  
He escaped.  
He's okay.  
He's okay! He'll live!

That soft, sweet cry draws back to me, closer, just coherent enough for my long, violet ears to pick up.

"Espa! Don't go over there! Follow me, please! It's not safe! Espa..! _Espa! ESPA—LUNA! WHATEVER! DEAR, COME BACK!"_

My name drawn out of his throat; and now I see the black fingers clawed over my throat, over my mouth. Now I am the one that has been captured; I am the one being chased over.

What have I done...

"_ESPA!"_

_Bay_

Golly gee, the sky's getting a couple shades darker than what I'm used to. And are those little dots of stars? Whatever the whites are, they're pretty. They make me smile all big and happy, which offers warm hugs of memories: of Mary our-dear-swanna and Quagsire our-dear-you-know-what respectively. Lots of things can make you smiley, if you just put your heart into it. The whole world is nice and smiley and happy. Also, I've got all these great friends as usual.

Admittedly, a big stickler on all this great smiley smileyness has to be the fact that our stroll will end in finding a weakened umbreon. Our dear midnight buddy who could be in a really bad place if we're not careful; oh, I hope he's okay! Umbre's so silly and cheerful, and he has that sway to him. I like that sway. It's a good sway; also, sway rhymes with Bay, which does happen to be my name.

I kick up my wings some, just because. "You guys enjoyin' this Mystery Dungeon?"

It's all pink and purple and fluff seems quite the carry-on item around here; even the trees are painted in this little layer of fringe. I've checked and ran my wing—and my face—I couldn't help it, I had to—over the otherwise smooth bark, and yes, white fluff coats an outline. "It's very... peculiar," states Llana. I like the way that slightly royal accent of hers punctures the "peculiar:" _pe-cuuuu-li-aar. _

"Yes," the pretty blue panpour besides her adds, "indubitably. Very peculiar."

"I feel as if I could accidentally set this entire place to flames—to ashes." Ember, as usual, isn't all as optimistic as I go; he's a bit of a fiery grump at times, but I guess we'd live in a colorless world without some grumps as well. And it's not like he's spitting fire at me. That is always a plus.

The ground makes funny _squueelllchhh _noises when the others step on its flat, pink surface. Since I just kinda glide and slither, I don't really do much; but the gentle magenta really does tickle my underbelly. I think it's pretty, and cute as well. Ember continues plotting about how easily he could whip out a fire and burn half this place down, so I hope he doesn't accidentally do that in the end. I really like Fluffwood. It's just... so... fluffy! And peaceful. I don't think the pokemon around here are big on fighting.

Llana was saying earlier how we seem to keep finding new Mystery Dungeons that are a lot more docile than the others. I can't really keep the names in my head—memory isn't all that sharp—but I recall well enough of that first one... it was Honeydew something: Honeydew Gully? Yeah, might be. And there was another one... Starry Dais, or something of the similar sort. And here in Fluffwood, all of them look at us adventurers like we're a little off our rockers, but not a single fluffy, pink jigglypuff, or a wigglytuff, or one of those igglybuffs, have raised a pretty pink paw against us. They just blink slightly, shake out a curl or so, and slump back into their naps.

I'm not best at remembering stuff I wasn't doing myself—via Honeydew Gully and Starry Dais—but the stuff I'm present in seems to stick in my mind really well. I feel real proud of myself, knowing that. I could list every single member of that team—Supple, they were called before the merge—with the leader Brutus the hitmonlee: maybe I'd give myself a pat on the back for that, if, you know, I had hands. Which I don't. Or feet, either. Or anything much but my wings.

I'm pretty easygoing like that, though. All cool with me. Slithering's always been my style, anyways, though it's not like I really had a choice in the matter. Oh well: better to appreciate what you can't change about yourself and smile any of the rough edges away. There's love everywhere, if you look for it, even in scary places like Ember's soul.

We all see how he looks at Cheeka and her pretty, long blue curls cascading like a nice waterfall down her spine. And her eyes are like shiny quartz gems, which are pretty too. She's just pretty overall. But I guess everyone is pretty in my eyes. That's what Elijah used to tell me. I like quoting him in my head; it keeps his voice alive.

Eventually the earth below starts to crumble and squish some, and toxic, purple fluids leak through. Little ponds of the slush form in some areas, and I'm pretty sure I should flit over those the most. The ground already starts to look some bit foreboding, but those puddles just spell out bad news. Better to keep the news good, stay out, and not let it get tainted.

Upon our team's step toward this old log in the distance—and it's huge, too, all soggy and fallen back in some parts, with creepy, purple mushrooms glowing and growing all over it, and the log itself is glowing some dark, scary aura too—Llana goes and pushes forward. Her petite little toes do a little dance as they walk. I think Elijah liked that a lot about her, and probably the light, white-yellow aura she gives off too. Though he used to tell me that he just liked her can-do attitude that she keeps stuttering and shoving off.

There's a lot of interesting things about Llana. She is the Sweethot, after all. I guess she's unstable in some places, but she's also really light and regal; it's just easy to find and reach out to her. We like to lean on her shoulder, and let her lean on ours too. She my buddy; I mean, Elijah says everyone my buddy, but she my buddy too. These guys are all special buddies of mine. They remind me of Elijah,and I like that. I like the memories I can keep hold of, like those times I've spent with him. He's talked to me a ton about Llana—I like being able to find and point out what he liked about her specifically. It makes me feel like he is right here. Or at least he's watching over us; definitely, if anyone, it's her.

"Are we ready?" she asks. We all do nice head bobs. "I... just wanted to check. I'm sure we all feel the danger roiling out from here; and besides, as... you know, I can just feel these things." A little smile. That's pretty too—_You think everything is pretty, _retorts a smiling emolga in my head.

Yes, I do, I say back.

Yes, I do.

With nothing less to say or do, Llana ducks her little green snivy head into the log hole and disappears with a puff of black—evil?!—smoke. Onward to Sogwood Forest. Ember, stepping in front of the weaker yet stronger panpour and placing a hand on her shoulder, exchanges a few gruff words I don't quite catch, and disperses in before her, the blue one just right after him. And then, after the last of her bright pink eyes watching over me have gone, I quickly slither, hop, and propel myself with those white, cloud-like wings into the lip of the log: a hot breath of black fills me up and I lose sight of a lot of things, sucked into this peaceful void which lasts a few well-earned moments before I fall hard onto something soft.

"Bay," grunts the something soft I fell hard onto. Red hair; a squeak and a leap, and I tumble back off of him, nearly crashing into Llana but as long as that crazy boy doesn't spit fire at me we're all good. Llana wouldn't hurt a caterpie, and she's cool like that. Ember would beat up the big mighty arceus, and he is very much not cool like that—or like any sort of that to be like. But he's just a tiny bit scary. I'm mostly sure he wouldn't just spew hot fire at me.

And we peel ourselves back up and strum up into motion again. It's a nice and steady sway to go by, one I like swaying to—again reminding me easily of the lost Umbre we're searching for. I'm sure he'll be okay, though—he's got a big, motherly Espa looking out for him!

Speaking of someone big and a little scary, the fiery pansear doesn't get up immediately to step back in line with Cheeka or Llana like he usually does. His cool, but not cool like that voice comes crashing down on me: "Why do you act this happy-go-lucky when Umbre's life is on the line here?"

Those dull pink eyes know how to drill into someone. Dull things usually can't cut, but Ember's seriously do. Do not ever—ever—get in this dude's way, mark my words.

"It's easier to be positive about it than to get all angst-y and stuff. The latter can really break you down, and that would be really bad since we're trying to keep our heads up and everything. I am worried for Umbre, just like the rest of you guys are, but if I get so riled up about it, I think I'd start to lose focus, you know?" I give off one of my grins. "And if I can't imagine being without Umbre, well, why should I? We don't know he's dead, and there's no way to prove it! He's run before, and he's really good at it."

The other boy snorts. His eyes sort of shift from me, like he's embarrassed. "Hah... that's not bad, actually."

"You think?" I lift up my head to face him good and head-on.

"Yes, I do think." And then, and only then, does Ember shake his head a little with that gleam in his otherwise dull pink eyes and walk his way back besides Cheeka. She gets a lot more secure with him beside her, I see—aw, that's cute. Besides, Ember didn't bite my head off like I thought he might, so that's always great. He can get some bump points with the panpour here.

Without much else to do, we trudge on and angle our way past those bubbling holes filled with an unruly purple. The ground makes funny squishy noises with each of their steps; and if I do that flit with my wings just because and land on the earth again, I get the little squish sound too. It's a little bit like music.

_Burble..._

Something bubbly—ooh, maybe a nice, babbling brook. Or maybe some other kind pokemon individuals that don't seem to care about us. Some of those lazier ones don't fight us; maybe these ones will want to play a game or something. Wouldn't that be cute?

_Buuurrrrrrrrbbbbb... BuuurRRRRBBBBB..._

Llana's tensed up. Her almond eyes crack a little. "Where is that..?"

Already, Ember and Cheeka have dispersed somewhere to the sides of the bubbling trees in sight. I can't really see them, but shifting footprints give them off. Also a little sneeze, a cut-off whimper—is the poor gal okay..? I wriggle back up to Llana, deciding I may as well stick close up with her. I can fight, if the need be; also, she can't, so I should probably defend her. That sounds like the good thing to do.

_BUURR...BUUUURRR..BBBBBUUUUURRRRRBBBBBBBBBBBBbbbbBBbbbBBBBB! _Something wet and bubbly springs onto the earth in front of us, unrolling into a nice, unhealthy bit of sludge. With that croaking thing... oh, golly, we're probably in a bad position here...

"Oh, dear..." Llana just about cuts out my thoughts and echoes them. Quick slides, a steaming whisper, and waters lodge out of wherever the heck Ember and Cheeka lie. Their little streamers are all shiny and pretty but quickly tangle into what appears to be a large, moving mountain of purple.

Lots of hazy purple. Yeah, that's probably really bad. "Llana, what's that?" I squeak from the corner of my mouth.

"Er..." She watches it with her green fists furled, eyes bright, and that golden aura twinkling like it always does. From her expression, I'd give a gander, she doesn't even know it's always there, or there at all for the matter. "A muk. I think. It's a little... large... Oh, dear, what's inside of it?"

I think there's this white and of course purple-striped blob wiggling in whatever the much bigger blob is made of. They're probably both poison pokemon—very evil looking. Ember wouldn't take a hit from that. Not even his grumpiness stands a chance here. I scoop a step back, closer to this trusty snivy.

She my buddy.

"I think that's..." It's got funny triangle ears—and a great purple muzzle. "Looks like that purugly we beat from the Glacier Palace. You remember her?"

Llana's breath does a quick hitch; she shoves it aside. "Oh, yes, I very well do. Purrple. Part of... Munaah's group of cronies, no? And it appears her... her corpse is vested in there."

"C-corpse? How did she die again?" I can't help it—this is creeping me out, now! Why a corpse? When did that big, fat purugly die? She was up and running back in the columns of ice when we were all attacking scary stuff, until... what was it...

"She walked herself off a cliff and ended her life. Same as Toxic." Right—Toxic, that toxicroak.

I feel guilty she and Purrple and Lady Munaah all got such sad, hardly lived-in names. They're like cracks in the ground for the homeless to live in—which they can't, rather. But... they... "Wh-what? Why is that..? Why..."

"I don't know, but there's... there's not much else we can do." That aura knits up around Llana like it's ready to consume her, all tense and terse and springing, rocking, bouncing. It's alive. I feel like that energy is definitely alive.

Our eyes lock—my little slits and her great almonds. Pretty almonds. They look delectable, would they be actual nuts instead of a pretty girl's eyes. Of course, I think everyone's pretty, but that's okay too—

_ZIIIINNNNGGGG! _

From Llana's face, I don't think she even saw what just happened, or registered it, but I very much felt that zappy line of her aura zap me right on! But I think she feels it; her body kind of sags, she looks nigh ready to just curl up and take a nap. But she's all tense, and I don't think she's ready to—but at the same time...

Why are my scales all shiny? I'm just getting these little glimpses but—

Okay something definitely just grew on my bum. I think it was my tail and—yes whoa what—my body, all nice and yellow—it's—it's stretching, most indubitably! Stretching up and down and my head is shaping and I recall when Jen had became that weird, aura salamance thing that was big and scary and beat stuff up and this—this is it?

My breath has been robbed from me—ow. Still I feel those effects, stretching me up, up, up, much taller than Llana, than the trees, even, just suddenly blooming in size and my wings behind me stretch too, up to the heavens, for all I can see. My size and shape and the markings bloom too, those cyan outlooks until I've become this weird, gigantic monster and ow my snout has been really shoved into an awkward shape. Ow.

Llana's officially gone unconscious. Uh-oh.

Also, I remember those clouds and the white star things from prior, and I toss my head to the side and oh, those are not clouds and stars. Well, they are, but they're not in the sky; they're laying waste to the Mystery Dungeon, tearing it right open, and there's this streak of purple really small I think it's Espa—ESPA!—but I can't tell—_THHHHHHKKKKkkkkk._

A very long claw just went right into my bright yellow skin and I didn't even feel it. That was absolutely terrifying, but I think the huge-as-heck purple blob of muk with the purugly corpse—it's decaying, oh yes, no eyeballs, filled with scratches, fur shedding to its own random accords, it's decaying—looks a little more surprised.

I mean, if he—she? it?—had any eyeballs to look surprised with. There are a pair of rather large holes filled with a strange, oily gook that could really be anything but smells rather putrid, like choking on poison and losing one's lunch as well, and all I know is that those gaps should have eyeballs.

Instead, there's a great big dead purugly right there between the eyes and abound. I don't think a normal muk is either this tall or has a purugly corpse instead of normal facial features. There's a slit for a maw, but teeth don't goop out. Just more oily gook that takes away my breath with rancid wheezes: rather disgusting creatures, if I do say so myself! I should teach this pokemon a lesson, right now!

Let's all be honest: if we randomly turned into a dragon-like monster and tried to attack, we wouldn't know what we were doing. Anything less than what I was doing, at least, could be considered whatever I must be doing: all foolery. Which I don't think made any sense to anyone, at all, even Ember and Cheeka, wherever they are now. Being the great big yellow dragon with a brand new scar that should have happened yet didn't, I spread wide open my maw and try to gag myself.

Yes, something does come out! Rippling, white flames—tinged with blue, even! What kind of flames are naturally blue here? Is that possible? Have I gone delusional? Apparently not, for the muk seems to go delusional first with his big flaps of arms flail to his burning, gushing face and his claws stab at the corpse on the inside and something red, vile, and something else very, very dark and thick and black slop out of his wounds and drip off of him, very slurred, to the ground. Ew, I think it got a little on Llana. I try to flap my tail over her but see the great, shiny spikes at the end and deliberate I'd better not.

Some majestic cry breaks off as I toss my next wave of flames. Then I realize that cry—this dragon cry—just came from me. I guess a dunsparce can be a dragon. Never knew that until now.

I attempt flying higher, or dodging closer or something, but I think I'm connected close to Llana and that aura—as Jen was, I think. It's been awhile, and I wasn't really there, so I could be wrong. Either way, it takes an anticlimactically long moment to burn and burst that bubbly muk thing into nothingness. I tried at first to go around the purugly... corpse... but it didn't really work. I glance back just as some light force of nature socks me in the stomach and I go sinking down.

And it only takes a few moments to open my eyes and see I've already shrunk to the earth of Truught again. Do I tell Llana? I dunno. Maybe I should. This could be a useful power, however it worked.

Slowly raising from her spot, Llana blinks a tired pair of almond orbs and slumps until she's gone and pratically fallen asleep on top of me. It's pretty handy I can be a mobile bed at times, but it also feels weird because I didn't know Llana drooled in her sleep until this very moment. Snivy spit now sits on my back. Never thought of it like that.

Slowly, as if hesitant to touch me and disintegrate on the spot, the primate buddies of ours slink back to our crew. "That was... odd," whispers Cheeka. "Very... very odd."

"Yes," agrees Ember. His dull eyes glisten again. "I... I suppose the Sweethot still has secrets we haven't quite exploited yet. Do you think it relates to that salamance from prior—Jen's... temporary change?"

"Indubitably," she goes back to him. "Yes, there has to be something Hope-related here."

"Um, like that aura around Llana we all see but don't know what to tell her about it with?" I squeak.

The primates share a glance; Ember shrugs. "Yes. Like that."

Then, because it's all we can do, we just sort of shrug off what just happened and wait for our dear buddy—because we're all dear buddies around here—to waken herself from that rest she accidentally got put into. I ask Ember if he'd like to hear a joke, and when he actually obliges, I finally wriggle some positivity into the moment, and we tell more jokes and little bits of laughs, and Ember actually doesn't sound like a big scary grump for once.

**Ah~ It's been awhile since I made multiple point-of-view chapters. Or just other than Llana ones. Which is weird because I used to aaallways do that to this story. I really enjoy it as well. X3 We'll see, though. I really like using Llana at certain times, and at other times it's better to not use/disturb certain characters. Like if I did Umbre earlier, you would've already have known he was okay and running, as shown now! Heh... but it's fun to switch povs x3  
I reaaallly enjoyed using Espa's... and Bay's was super fun as well, heh... I'm happy to do those. They're funsies, yayyy~  
Kudos if you recognize the references to Foggy and Sogwood Forests. I'm sure a lot of you can recognize Foggy (koffkoffPMD) but Sogwood's from a... very different game. x3**

**WOW, THIS CHAPTER IS LONG! oOo They usually do not get this long, heh. But I did think it might get a little crazy. I mean you all read what happened. Thanks for reading on~ ^^**


	16. Tying Loose Ends

Chapter 16: Tying Loose Ends

_Fizzing and cracking. Hysterical whispers—that cut short. They die off. I don't hear them afterword. The usual, comforting clouds of pink that wisp about me when I dream in such a thematic state have gone and dyed themselves a moody, gusty black. They seem to tug at me, make me feel threatened in my spot, as if they'll tear me right open with tooth and claw: and they're only bright, puffy clouds, ripe for the picking. _

_This one looks like a gentle, angular virizion; this one looks like a happy-go-lucky dunsparce; and this one looks pink. Bright, bubbly pink as it sings and swims in space. Purple flowers sit like scars on her backside._

"_A-ah..." I recognize her. Of course I do. She knew I would as those bright, daring, pink irises burn through me. "Is that—"_

"_Don't you dare call me that vile name! I asked you not to! I asked you to remember me differently!" The bounding, limp clouds swing aimlessly like the stars above have hung them. And their colors bloom dramatically from black to grays to a near white then fleshy pink then spikes of hot, vibrant red boiling down the puffy curves. I feel threatened._

_My mind, like a tunnel, pinpoints this little speck of pink glow: of Lady—no, she didn't want me to call her that; the memory surfaces. When she died. When she spoke that final will, and she pleaded me to not look back at that name, and I was left as her soul left me and we parted ways and—what are you doing here?—you're dead. _

_Desperation clings like a rancid odor. "What should I call you, then?"_

_The pastel-colored ghost—if that's even what she is today—blinks at me, shyly. Her rosy outlook colors the clouds, and peace roughly blankets her desperate, chubby little soul. "You don't have to call me anything. I rather like that—the pastel-colored girl. Yes." Those bright—too bright, brighter than stars, brighter than Cheeka's—eyes stare back at me paranormal-y with a lilt to her head, to her whisper._

_A chant of yes. "Yess... yyeeeeeeeesss... yeee...eee...ssssss... I would very... very much... like that..." The spit lodged in my throat tightens, makes it hard to swallow, to breathe. My eyes and nose stream. But apparently she's been renamed: the pastel-colored girl; the pastel-colored creature; the pastel-colored corpse; the pastel-colored ghost. And that is what she has become._

_Here I float in the midst of these pink clouds, staring at the single one with purple flowers painted onto her so brightly. I don't know what to feel; it's a sudden shock, as if unfrozen from time and released. Do I smile?—should I still fear her?—is there something else... more important... tugging in my mind right now..?_

_Shadows. Thus follow what Kyo whispered so off, so painfully:_

"_Do you... see... them?  
"They're everywhere.  
"Oh, yes, I know I do.  
"So well, so lividly. They won't go away.  
"They don't leave, you know.  
"They sit there in my sight and I think they laugh.  
"I hate them.  
"I hate them so much."_

_And he's right; they won't go away. The clouds mob me from pink to black, big, moody black once more, to an encore of puffy hatred, and it suffocates me. Lady Mu—the pastel-colored girl, filling and filling and overflowing with desperation—has gone._

I find myself baffled and within a rush of surprise to waken to the bantering of the most unlikely characters to banter as one. Supposedly, as Ember and Cheeka I know have a close bond to one another, they could be so lively, though at the same time I would never see their sorts of personality types to be the ones that rub up, contract friction, and induce jokes. Bay, though: his lively dunsparce self does spark personality.

But I thought he didn't really bode well with the more serious primates. Apparently I was wrong, and we all can be connected as one soul: one Paradise. I... I truly love this ability to string my soul with these others; I believe Elijah is connected to us as well, even if he...doesn't live on the same plane as us any longer, and I strongly wish to avoid that loss again.

"Llana, oh golly, you're awake! Thank goodness! Thank anyone!" Bay's bubbly, blue-scaled grin welcomes me in. "I think I'd evolved... like Jen had at that Great Glacier battle—all of that—into this dragon dunsparce thing, and anyway, it was really cool but.. I saw Espa! And she was running, running, and she nearly ran into that cloud over there." I turn around at the cue of the rest of his odd speech, and true as his word, slowly slobbering onto the edges of the Sogwood Forest is this soupy mix of a rush, a rush of building, doubling, bubbly clouds swarming overboard, overflowing, taking over, takeover. I doubt there is something to stop it as well.

Besides the creature in ownership of it: just maybe. If we do stumble into Tim and what must indubitably lead to Espa—Umbre, as well—perchance his seeing me will again trigger that release-them-she-can't-see-this sort of emotion rigged inside of him, or whatever stops him from killing in my presence.

It's not... my... self... is it? No; no; his Bittercold doesn't plunder me down, I couldn't be tainting him with my own obvious-enough works. He's... content, where he is.

His clouds that he's started appear to be shadows. Shadows are evil. Kyo told me this—I would trust anything Kyo had the nerve enough to speak with his own broken-down mind to his tongue with my life, with my everything. Because his mind is so addled as it is, and this proves a mark of his recovery—I trust him. Anyone who wouldn't has lost it. Simply, absolutely: lost it.

Ice, I see, has begun to fall and spike the burly fortress of black, bulging cumulonimbus. "They're this huge monsoon of black, no?" What sounds like a phrase I'd hear from Bay comes dripping out of Cheeka's maw. Their banter seems to have connected them further; my heart lifts up and takes flight: a short one, but a flight, indubitably.

"Let us be off. We must search out Espa. She'd know where Umbre is, where Tim lies." Ember, our conductor as he always goes, leads us off into the purple oasis. I cling to the pale fingers in front of me—Cheeka—and Bay surges on as our rear. His gentle slithering calls for his movement. When I turn back, our eyes lock and smiles are spread, shared.

He's such an upholstered personality—such a sweet, imaginative dunsparce. And with his eyes scrunched up and smile bright, it's as if nothing can get in his way for long.

Out of just about every single soul in our group, even neglecting his closeness to Elijah, I feel like I've gotten to know Bay nigh the longest. Of course, my mind wobbles back as well onto Burr, sweet, silly, slightly flirtatious, each to the point and on of annoyance Burr. How I love that dear timburr, the brownie, as he's called affectionately, as he can be. We don't mention how it covers up Tim being the smoky-furred one, even as it does so effortlessly.

Either way, as long as I'm flanked by these pokemon, these diamond-studded souls that have strung through me with destiny, with purpose, with fate and love and each all collided, somehow sewing into that word teammate seamlessly, I feel a safety and a joy. Let me stand here with them for as long as possible; let them live out their days, do not die prior to the ripening of age: may Elijah be the only one, my soul cries softly.

And now we have Umbre. Our feet _squelch _and _squirch _into mixed, vile, purple soil that squishes the most awkward, most cringe-worthy squeaks, and my heart bumps into my chest and I just want to find Umbre, take him back away from this place, and dash off.

The others who must be loitered about here, our other connected groups of pokemon... Tim could know they exist, but he hasn't stumbled upon me. For all I know, he'll use this moment here to flush out each and every character in these overlapping Mystery Dungeons so that only Burr, and Mina, and myself are left. That is, of course, without including Kyo, Mary, Quagsire, or Gurdurr—which I do believe count but the timburr doesn't quite see them as a threat like he does, say, Zoey.

His hate for the oshawott runs in his blood. She's here now, surrounded by creatures that I know will hang onto her and watch over her. She'll be okay wherever she is. I'll be okay for as long as Tim doesn't realize I'm here or tromp us with his monsoon—yes—black, all-encompassing monsoon of cumulonimbus monsters brimming with ice and who knows what other monsters.

As we go on, Cheeka and Bay provide details of what precisely happened while I'd so strangely lost consciousness. The cheery dunsparce begins with, "Well, first off, there was the muk. And... Purrple, yeah, her, she was in there, a corpse, a very sad corpse to be honest but, you know..." The jolly, low pitch evens out slightly at the end. A solemnity, I feel; my heart aches slightly that the purugly, even after death still found herself caught in a terrible fate, an unstoppable, poisoned—quite literal—cycle.

"So, then," whispers on the panpour, flicking back her waves of blue hair, "you'd begun to lose your consciousness and swoon over, and Ember and I were trying to somehow subdue that hulking monster when we look over and see this sort of transformation striking upon Bay... and he stretches and pours into this great, long, massive form. His wings were edged with gold."

"Oh my goodness, my wings—they were?! That's totally rad!"

A grin spreads over Cheeka's pale expression as well. "I know, right? You looked super great! But anyways... Bay was struck by the muk monster's claw and nothing even scarred him!—one bit! I couldn't believe my own eyes! And then he roared an insane dragon roar, incinerated the thing to sludge, and just shrunk right back down. I could hardly believe it."

"I...I tried to save Purrple's, um, body, but... it didn't really work out in the end."

My voice releases a sudden hitch. "Oh, Bay, it's fine, we understand—! She didn't deserve what fate prepared for her... perchance she finds peace where she is now, but truly, Bay, it's okay."

"Ah... heh, thanks, Llana." I nod slightly, smile a little. "Elijah loves your smile, by the way." I become doubled over with a blush that nearly strangles me.

"So, that's basically all that happened—" Whether or not my dear mutant psychic friend had a need to continue her sentence or not, the crash of a sticky, purple substance with vibrant, poison-tinged fur landing atop her and being quickly burnt by Ember silences her. Once able to shove the creature back with a tinge of psychic energy, Cheeka and Ember join up to send streams of water or fire respectively to cut straight into the skunky, sending it reeling, reeling, gone.

The pansear snorts. "I rather hate it when Mystery Dungeon idiots get cocky." We each voice our acquiesce to the statement as another ball of purple, poisonous fluff falls from the overhang above and Bay quickly forces himself in to headbutt the imprudent idiot away. The pokemon lets out a grumble before losing itself in the midst of purple—and a rarity of green—fronds. We don't see its face poke out again.

"Veeeeerrry cocky," admits Bay, his jolly tone hung out for us to see and squinted eyes in their sequential patterns as usual. His wings flit out again, for what reason I see none other than simply the ability to do it, the joy that may come from it. I try to imagine their already-shimmering tips lined by gold. I can't truly see it—like trying to picture the young, stumbling Jen with her silver braids as a great, turquoise salamance instead of the bagon she prefers herself to be.

Without much else to do, my teammates swarmed like a bubble about me, they use their powers of normal efficiency—with no better name—or psychic or water and fire counterparts to spread and demolish the creatures that attempt to harass—or whatever plan it is—to us. Whenever one craft of fire or water or normal-affiliated attack grows weak, or one of my dear friends loses their footing and the tire is in their eyes, then I come in and my own uses heal them.

It's all I can do; it's enough.

We run and they attack and I heal, I resupply, whatever ails are crafted I stifle, and eventually one of our parties must come through clean. The fact that they're the Mystery Dungeon pokemon—the awkward stumbling blokes without true minds wired into them, true lives coloring them—gives us quite the easy win. These are only mindless creations made by the Dungeon itself, unlike the muk that Bay was forced to kill himself. The fact that Purrple sat in its head would prove that enough, but I'd seen the way it moved, not like it didn't have a mind but was controlled, hard and jagged motions that slopped poison in its wake.

Eventually, as expected, they run out of able pokemon, and they cannot regenerate that quickly, I'm sure, and the monsters—if that word even suits them—of Sogwood Forest die out. We, of course, as expected, most indubitably, have won.

The trees have begun to show more greens than purples, and it seems to assure that we're taking correct turns. "I recall that where I saw Espa, she was in this sorta area as she ran. Also, she looked in a rush. If we're not all pooped, d'you think we should run harder?"

Hardly after he finishes Ember cries in that assertive tone "Yes." So we do. Fronds of bright green and mushy, comfortably brown dirt skirts past me. I see large, shining rocks of silver and trunks with burly roots that could compete with Tim's. Their branches plow out and release finger-like sticks, leaves the color of chlorophyllic tears hanging tight. A slight wind rustles the leaves, shakes them, but still they hold on. How... sweet.

I hang onto my friends—to Paradise—as if they are that tree. And I will not let go, no matter which gale blows into them. One part of that tree, dead or alive, connects to Elijah: it forevermore will.

In the midst of my metaphoric tree creations, I stumble straight into a green flank. "A-Ah—ffft!?" A sneeze wrings out from me and the creature nearly does my skull in until those bright, violet orbs catch me in close.

"Llana! What are you doing here!"

Ember shoves himself past me and shares a glance with the virizion. One of his arms, I notice, twirls about my own, as if to assure we're friends. "Tim is here, and we'd rather not allow any of you to be attacked with him about. See those clouds?" His other hand pokes out from beside us and points the burly monsters roaring up a monsoon overhead, their twinkling bits of ice just ready to dive in. "Him. He's in control, of course. We're here because he'd have no shame killing all of you at once, but seeing Llana always throws whack to his system. Or Burr, on the lucky occasion: he and Mina are still safe. As well, you didn't know he's there. We need to work together."

"Good. At least they're not bumbling about here as well." She sighs softly. "And they'll be able to watch over Kyo..."

We all seem to release that breath of relief upon stumbling upon one another. "Oh, Vivi, hi! It's so great to see you! Heyyy!"

Her eyes brighten. "A-ah! Bay? You, as well?"

Cheeka and himself scuttle out of the fronds, the shades; blue fur over yellow scales; smiles tracing each cheek. "Yes, that would be me! Don't worry, we left this group of other pokemon called Team Supple—they're all very diverse and the like—to watch over Paradise for us with Burr and Mina and all that! They're the reason we even figured out that Tim was here and very much coming! So thank goodness to them." His head bows slightly to his dear friend—our dear friend.

"Are you going to follow us, then?" Her head turns back to the others slowly crawling up from behind: tired, no doubt. My presence seems to leaven them, even as they don't see me. Relief wells up within me when Zoey's bubbly white head shows, rocking next to Jen and Roland.

Sure as gold, Espa isn't with them. Bay; we need to find her. He's most indubitably correct, oh, we do. And Umbre... they could be heading straight into the eye of that storm.

Ember, of course, sees this as well. "Vivi, take your team and continue heading back from where you came. See if Espa or Umbre headed off. Just in case. I'm sure F is nearby; Llana, Bay, and Cheeka and I will continue off nearer the storm just to double-check. Make sure they didn't bumble in there." None of us verse the fact that we know how close Espa has gone.

There is hope that Umbre—or possibly, just possibly, even the espeon—have gone back as well.

She sighs again, softly. It does hurt her, seeing we should split up again, it'd be safer, and the overlying fact that her beloved is so broken now. Perchance, when the cumulonimbus aren't crashing down on us, we'll be able to tell her what Kyo told us prior. "Okay. I don't see much else we can do... F! Eeeeeeeeef! Come back here!"

With a slurred nod, she goes on, and so do her tired, lonesome companions without the graces of an umbreon or espeon within their ranks. They just may run into the others there. Just may.

_Espa_

Those black-furred fingers clasp over my muzzle, even as I fade in and out of consciousness. My mind only orbits about the shamefully idiot I'm full of, and that Umbre must have heard me and must have registered where I am now. Scarlet orbs will be showing up soon.

Tears. They won't stop streaking down my cheeks, covering Tim's dark fingers that I just keep choking on and crying over. Umbre, I'm sorry; Kinks, forgive me; love, please help me. I'm so... stupid... My head bows over but the dratted timburr pulls it back up.

"I'm waiting for the right moment..." His whisper burns more than strokes my ear. I flick him back with the lobe; a claw sends a cut through it, something slimy gooping loose, blood dripping—

He just cut off the tip of my ear. If my tears weren't so lonesomely crying for the dear midnight boy I'd gone and lost again, already, maybe I'd cry for the ear too, but it is just a tip, just a little bit of my violet ear. Umbre, please promise to tease me about it later; I want to hear your sweet, silky voice so terribly much right now, feel your flank stumble against mine with that strange sashay, see you. But to see you also means you'll die, doesn't it? You'll stumble into me and die, and I can't have that happen.

I love you too much to let your life go to waste before me. I'd kill myself before that could happen. I choke under these tears, under my idiocy, under Tim's disgusting red paw and disgusting red claws that so gently stroke under my slender throat.

"Espa... Espa!" A wheeze; a pant. He's coming close; no, Umbre, turn around, you fool, I've gone and caught myself don't let this fate happen to you! His eyes pinpoint further down: bright crimson dots. "Luna—Espa—love! My sweet love!" No... Umbre... no... I can't stand to look at him. He sees what I see.

The world suddenly goes numb as a foot kicks my legs over, some things crack, goop goes flying, I burn and I can't see and a sudden, raw, cold sensation takes over as I'm scooped over and tossed straight into those clouds. Ice bites into me. I can't see anything.

I try to speak his name and a cough erupts. I'm stuck on my side; I can't see him; the tears freeze over for him to remember me by. Umbre... Kinks... love...

Umbre... Kinks... love...

Umbre...  
Kinks...  
love...

_Llana_

Like a shadow, like a wisp, a body stands before us, frozen in place about the green fronds and trees. Black. Paws carefully poised. He looks... frozen? But after this running, after losing our voices raw and numb and he's right there, gold loops ringing about him and everything, I have to say it.

"Umbre." The royal accent lines thick, like my tongue. Thick and broken and incredible, unbelievable.

Dirt billows beneath my feet, a comfort now that I want to toss my worries onto and cry for. But he won't move; he won't speak; he doesn't acknowledge our arrivals, our existences. "Um...bre?"

Still no movement. Bay tries. "Hey, Umbre, buddy, we found you! That's... that's amazing! You're okay"—aside from the minor, red scratches on his flank and hand-prints from Tim that are so numerous they couldn't be Umbre's blood—"and... we can go home now?"

"Espa..." He's spoken. He's crying; it's in his voice. "Espa... Luna... love... my sweet darling... love of my life, my dearest... Es...Es...pa..."

_Umbre_

Voices against me. They don't matter. They question me—don't matter. Nothing matters. Espa matters. Yes, that, that matters. And now she's not here. And I'm frozen because I can't bear to see that strong, beautiful soul fall.

They question me again. Call out my name. I repeat myself, I repeat all that I know how to. All that matters. And it's she. She went for me, of course. I should have masked my scent, stupid Umbre. Let her go right into his paws and look where she is now.

More. Questions.

They don't matter.

Nothing matters.

So I move immovable limbs, I toss them over and go, because that's what I have to do. And I run and I run and I run and I run right into those clouds coming straight for me, straight for all of us. It doesn't matter if those questions were from Arceus himself—this. Is what matters. Dark clouds and ice buffet me; this is what matters. Something slimy trickles down me; this is what matters. And I call her voice and search for her eyes until I see them, cold and wet and dead.

No.

Not dead.

Not quite.

_Llana_

"_UMBRE!"_

_"UMBRE, NO!"_

"_WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?"_

"_NOOO! COME BACK! PLEASE!"_

We're all screaming and crying and throwing ourselves at him, but whether or not he heard us, we don't figure. His midnight pelt disappears into the cold, ice-topped, burly clouds: the monsters. The nerve of him. But at the same time I know in my heart he's looking for her.

Espa's gotten herself thrown in there by Tim, and his dark eyes must be trailing me now: what will I do? My friends have to stop at the edges of the clouds. As strong as they are, as impossibly well as this team rolls, they can't do anything now.

But I—I can. I most indubitably can.

Tim? Do you see me?—good, I'm sure you do, so watch this. Watch this.

I duck into the shadows of the clouds, suck in a breath of ice—acid down my throat—and plunge through. The others whisper words, but they each recognize this. They recognize who I am—what I am, from the inside to the out, and instead of a chorus of praises, worries, hopes, follow me. Somehow, a brightness seems to swamp me: well, not quite, but this bubble that just pushes the ice clouds back. Cold doesn't touch me—nothing does but the soil below.

There aren't even trees here. They must have been swamped—annihilated. I'm running over dead trees. The thought sickens me, but Espa and Umbre root me on. I have to find them. I can see so brightly here, and they wouldn't have come far.

In the same direction as the umbreon, though I don't see him, I feel cool air crushing upon me. Whatever I'm in here, it's closing, it's breaking. I cry out: their voices shine clear through my mouth. Finally, in moments that weigh like much, much longer times, seasons passing by in the number of seconds, there lie the bodies.

Cold breaths pour past their muzzles. Espa's eyes shine like her gem. I clutch them close as I pour my warmth, my power, my everything, and their furs clump close and muscles move and suddenly they're clutching me, and I'm cold, and I can hardly move on my own. It's tiring, it's cold, it's drenching me thin.

The bubble supports us for quick handiwork of time before bursting, and the cold drives through. But they don't stop, they surge on. Clouds—they're running quickly, running fast, too fast, going past us, we're losing the entrance, losing life, losing everything ahead, I can't feel myself.

Nothing. Nothing—I feel nothing.

Something slips, and I vanish from my conscience.

Numb—cold—alleviating? No—a deep drop from my mind. From safety. From sanity?—perhaps. Perchance. It's a cold wait. Dropped straight in. Left to—to what?

Long seconds stretch out with a tick, tick, originating from me, like I'm a bomb. Things ache. Places hurt. Others bleed—something sticky, at least, I can't tell if they originate from cuts or if they're red at all. Or not. Always that aching question, like a constant ball bouncing onto my head: or _not _or _not _or _not _or _not. _I doubt I've been out for very long. It's the only thought that keeps me company.

It stays like this for some time. Me and my thoughts and that's it.

Until, that is, a voice lulls into existence. I don't understand the words; I couldn't, even if I pulled my hibernating heart into it. Just fuzzy background. It does mean I'll... waken. Eventually. I'll be okay—it's all I can be.

"..on't...ie..." Individual sounds: not all, but enough. Enough bloom to hear. "I...n't...l.t...ou..."

Repeated. "Do.'t...d..." The pause, again. A sigh, a whisper. "I...wo...le...y.u..."

"Don't die." The pause. "I won't let you." He's—deep voice—repeating the same words. Over and over again. In my ear.

Powerful arms, draped with soft, dark fur, hugging me close. To him.

To Tim.

The pause lengthens betwixt one phrase or another. My head, shadowed with a new warmth by the head looming above me, drawing closer, closer—

Too close. Too close to Tim. Lips on my head, warm breath on my cheek—too, too close to Tim.

He sees—feels—knows—my eyes are open. The darker ones pool back, face me, lock eyes. "You're not allowed to die; I'll let them live if I have to. You can't... You can't..! I... won't allow of it... Llana." I just sit there, not knowing what to say, not knowing what to do... not knowing how to feel, what to feel. From that voice, from those words, I know he'll return me eventually, now that it's evident that I've healed.

But... what? Why? How? Who...what.

What.

**Yeah whoa what. Ah... I remember back when Tim looked mysterious and nice. Then he got grr. Then he got really grr. Now maybe he's a little crazy... a little... desperate.**

**Lady Munaah: CHANGE MY NAME! Also... ugh that word. Ugh.**

**Me: Hwah. **

**Zoey: OOH CAN I SING?**

**Me: yes**

**Zoey: THAT PASTEL COLORED PIG; SHE TOOK OUR LIVES, AND MADE IT GRIM. STUPID PASTEL-COLORED PIGS, ALL THEY DO, IS LIE AND WIN!**

**Me: Wait pig... oh. Wow. Pigs don't exist. Whatever. **


	17. He Cuts my Mistrust in Half

Chapter 17: He Cuts my Mistrust in Half

Against the majority of my judgment, I soon find myself staying with the timburr in his nicely-put-together wooden tree home—lessons from Gurdurr shining through—for a bit longer—longer than I'd expected. He displays his home quietly; there's not a bloodstain to be found on it. Since when did Tim still have manners?—as nosy as the question may sound, when has he acted this kindly prior to the first moment I met him? I... don't recall this sort of cleanliness from a creature usually drowning head to toe in another entity's own blood.

"I prefer it this way. Much nicer... rather than the other way I could have done this." He knows what I'm thinking about; he always knows what I'm thinking about. My heart spikes into my throat rather silently in comparison. I turn and find the large, well-cut window—no glass—providing view over fuzzy green treetops of the small ball of a sun, bobbing in the sky like a golden magikarp out of water.

Quietly, my feet scuffing over wood as I traipse, I move over to such window and place my hands over the smooth, sanded-down sill. "That's quite a view."

His presence. Straight out behind me. Slightly shadowing over my back. I feel his Bittercold like I do the Sweethot inside of me—as ridiculous as the names sound—as they are provided by Stella—I know there is power in them as well: an insane, improbable power that wreaks havoc on our insides and eventually plagues the outside world as well, though I suppose I'm in the better light here. "I prefer you over it." The hands, fluffy and soft and gray, slip over mine easily.

The worst part of this slowly sickening sense draining down into my stomach is that I can't tell whether I'm content by him or disturbed. Should I?—how do I?—what? "I—I'm not that great," I mumble, "someone simpler like Elijah would be better suited for me."

"No." A great shake of his furry head. "You're suited for me. And I'm suited for you. The emolga was never a part of it." But yet he was... and I love him—loved him—will always love him—and Tim, you killed him. Because I love him. And because he loves me. "I could have killed them as well—the espeon. The umbreon. But you ran into your doom just to save them... maybe you would have made it on your own whether or not I stopped it, but I didn't like seeing you toss your life in there so easily."

My royal accent clasps over his deeper, darker, inscrutable tone: "I wasn't trying to, rather. I... want to save those who mean so much to me. I don't want to lose any of them, yet you insist on taking them back so that you have me." Whether or not he grows terse, my voice isn't going to raise any higher. I don't want to fight Tim. I already understand he wouldn't hurt me; and I'd rather not shout at him anyway.

I think he smiles behind my head. "You don't need any of them, rather. You just need me."

"They have real thoughts and emotions and lives too—just like us. And..." I stare at my fingers, wedged under his. Does he see how much the pale green tips shake? Perchance not. I wouldn't mind did he not notice. "I love them. They're these dear entities to me. I don't want to keep fearing their losses."

A soft sigh from the timburr. He draws closer, just slightly, takes his hands off of mine, and places them around me. I still don't know what to feel—how I should feel, so I sit there stupidly and numbly. "They will die eventually. We don't have that fear, unless the other goes and tosses herself into the creations I've caused. Neither of us will die until the other does upon the hands of the one. They, on the other hand, could die from any single soul that has a blunt edge and knows how to use it. Much easier to rely on the one that can kill you—and won't. You know I won't; I know even if you wanted to, you can't. Safer." Safer, but I love them. Aren't some risks worth it? I found it worth loving Elijah, even after his life was lost by the claws of this creature.

This creature: how do I even refer to him? Is there anything but? Is there anything? "The risks are worth it. We each love one another and that is how it goes."

"I think you're a little crazy." A great, warm chortle splits from him: oddly, it's here that a warmth runs in my veins. Now, it seems, I feel a slight... safeness, with this creature. This creature. Tim. "Though I suppose you're allowed to be a little crazy. You must certainly think I am, to kill all of your friends off."

"When you put it like that—yes, I do." Why am I finding comfort as we so easily slide around the topic of my beloved entities—Vivi, Bay, Ember, Jen, Zoey, and others, so many others—in death? Death: I can't have that happen. But I suppose as long as Tim's claws lay sheathed as he hugs me, they won't be dying.

His laugh goes softer; I can feel the burning warmth in him now. Jovial. "I guess that makes me a little crazy too. Maybe one day I'll see error in my ways. But for now... I only care about whether or not I have you. If I kill them, I'll just cut around you, because I love you, and I'm not letting you die."

He just—_he just._ "I rather doubt I could repeat those words back to you," I splutter.

"One day," is his simple, airy response: "one day. Give it time."

I doubt I need time when you're talking about killing the creatures whom I feel the need to stay as one with: with Paradise. I hardly comprehend why you'd tell me you love me, off first, and then feel the need to rub it in with how much you want to kill my friends.

Yes, I guess that makes both of us a little crazy—why I've become on terms with the monster—though again Tim sounds slightly more inviting, a softer, easier roll of the tongue: _Timmm—_is a mystery I can't quite wrap around, though I suppose he's always had something going for me.

Me.

"So when can I go back to these friends you want to kill?" Still, somehow my heart is light in my chest, as if made of warm, gentle feathers. Tim... is doing this to me; but he's also trying to murder these beloved creatures of mine, which adds the sour note, which keeps me from wanting to ever stay with him here.

Perchance... if he does change his mind... I... I would? I... m-might... I just might. Not a large, black, definite no. "I suppose I won't be able to get much more time out of you before you just slink away and find them yourself." He pauses. "When you leave, go straight until you run into the forest thicket. Go left. Don't come near it. Then you'll encounter a rather large silvery stone; veer right after. You'll go through a bit of Mystery Dungeon but find a small path. Take that path. It eventually dries out, but keep going its general direction and you'll come across the one to Post Town and... Paradise."

For some odd reason, my heart jumps when he says that: _pah-rah-daiisssse. _"Thank you, Tim."

He doesn't jolt, but I feel the newfangled rush in him from me using his name. "Thank you, Llana. I'm sure I will see you again.

Another pause. "Although we are quite similar, I find that there are differences between us. She told of one—desperation." It flickers down my spine in a cold rush. "There are others, but you don't have that reeking desire of something you can't have. It breaks you, snaps you in pieces so unbearably thin..."

And he just... leaves it at that. No more adieu. His soft, furry, silvery arms come back from about me and he steps back once, again, a little more, with a slight nod. I echo the nod and crawl back to the door less frame for an entrance, slinking through the smooth wood and carefully traipsing down the ladder. I don't know how to feel.

I simply have lost the emotion, of how I should. What I should do—how I should react. I've lost sense with that dark-furred creature; my head filled with fluff, my actions... I simply don't know now.

An unfortunately short string is all I hold with me, all the memories I can hold now: Tim feels able to kill another of us, but we have Brutus and his team of—team Supple—of their pokemon with their ability to watch over us successfully; and as well: Elijah. Simply him soaked up in his effulgence. I do love Elijah. And Tim can't simply crush that emolga out of me. Inside of me, soft and squishy and pathetic, is the part of me that can never stop loving the cheeky creature. And I realize with each heavy step that he actually is similar to his best friend, Bay.

Neither of them can hold strong first impressions. As I recall, Elijah had lashed out at us with his words and took a painfully long traipse of time before he and I could see... the meaning within us. And here it shines in my heart. As well—Bay was quiet, was shy, quickly took what my Sweethot—though I didn't see it then—heart gave, that crystal, that similarity to Stella I hold so dearly.

Her purple gem; my little crystal. And then I handled it off so easily. Though he'd lost it after Vivi—who as well in that first encounter and prior had grown cold after the loss of her beloved Kyo, his missing soul in her life which grew dark and painful—slapped it out of his hand and I scuttled it back into my neckline and thus forgot of its presence as I usually do, like Stella's and like mine—forgotten, stringed importance, easy to forget but never out of one's reach, and Stella will never grow out of my grasp—and thus... here we are now: one big happy family.

The term, though a bit loose, feels correct in my heart. I smile softly to myself at it. We're one big happy family: yes, Stella and her buddy Herb, even, included. All of us; all of them. I skirt about the topic of Tim, quite unsure where I should go there, but in the meanwhile I do still have them... and only Elijah died and Espa and Umbre—they're okay, they're okay, oh, sweet bliss their lives have been strung into safety.

I whisper to myself as I stroll past the forest: "Thank you, Tim." Somehow, somewhere inside of me, I think I do mean it. As well—he can't kill again.

As Bay said: _We're like... carefully molding a safety in place. So that Tim can't get in. _And again: _So that Tim can't get in. _Now... I suppose he can't. Him and all of his darkness can pick up its icy confines and be forced to travel elsewhere.

Again, as I don't know how to feel, the news doesn't truly strike me. Yes, he is the Bittercold; yes, he is my opposite; yes, we are connected: and yet... this is my home. He doesn't understand it and he wants to kill it: my friends; my safety; this joy, this place. And he wants... to kill it.

Simply: wreak it apart, strew havoc, see some insides bleed out innards and of course red, red, red, and then take me as I'll have nothing else. He already took Elijah; stop, Tim. How do I show him that the hole in my heart continues to rip, and throb, and break, with each breath—with each passing step? Can I? Is... there a way? Or do I simply sit here and sulk here and drain myself out with the holes he's punctured in me?—scared me with?—torn me apart, through and through, scattered droplets of pain and blood and a catharsis of whatever else with?

And here I am, questioning him anyways. With a careless stride, a loping stumble, I veer past the rather large shiny boulder and soon enough into the yellowed pathway that crunches harmlessly beneath my tiny toes.

It appears I also believe in him. But he's shown off that thorn of ice—that desperation bubbling, broiling below inside of him. And I saw the pain flickering in his suddenly bright orbs when I tossed myself into his manufactured ice cloud of burly, black clouds and darkness and others of the sort. I cannot let him take Espa and Umbre, can I? I cannot let him take any of them.

So far, I realize with a new, fresh breath of air, I've succeeded. He hid Zoey and—without realizing—Jen: both found their way back to me and we even caught ourselves that delightful chespin of Roland. Then Tim captured himself Ember and Cheeka in that musty, peaty Mystery Dungeon inside the other Mystery Dungeon, and I found him on the verge of whatever could it be and stopped him because he can't. And then... and now... he's gone... and kidnapped the umbreon we so dearly love from beside his mate. And he tore Espa a pink hole into his clouds and Umbre ran after her and I tailed after them—and to find them—and to save them—and to wake up to Tim pleading I stay alive—and to tell me he saved them too...

They are safe; that is what matters. And now with the meowstic whose name begins with T, and Brutus the patchy brown leader with his enthusiastic outlook, and with the other characters like America blending into their odd but all-around group, we have found safety. We will be... okay.

Alone with my thoughts, only the sun high above—though its descent is nigh approaching—and bobbling beside me, like Zoey should be, I continue to walk and walk in that single direction: onward. And on I go. It's all I can do but move and search and wait to find those who mean to me, mean these great emotions bubbling on the inside that sweeten like berries and ripen... and I refuse to let another grow bitter, to be plucked from my heart. Ghosts of fruits that cling don't weigh me down with the love in reality as those alive, the multifarious produce alive, and I will fend off what Tim tosses at me.

I stumble on. My feet grow raw, numb, from the constant scrape of my walking, especially after whatever I'd done to myself in that ice cloud. A piece of me still cannot hold to belief that after what I'd done, after everything, Tim still plans to murder my friends when I'm not looking. At least—with a sigh—he would never hurt Burr: his closest being to a brother. Or Mina as well, who must seem sisterly to him by now.

Even killers have family that connect to him. However I fit in... I understand quietly that I do. Somewhere. But for now... we live. We all live and still, Tim has failed to end any lives besides Elijah's—always that blob of warmth pulsating in my chest, reminding me, easily after the timburr brought me against memory again.

I don't shudder at the thought of him and give an offhand—unsure—smile to myself.

The path has withered into nothing, but a keen enough sense of direction, not noticeably helpful or hindering, keeps my point spot-on enough that eventually my dull eyes strike over the ground, a muddy, warm, dirt trail that scrawls up and loops forward: behind lie the old, broken, Ragged Mountain: a Mystery Dungeon I'd bypassed a long time ago in order to first pass into Paradise and Post Town. I've had the occasional scramble through it, to reach the other side of Mystery Dungeons, like Sogwood Forest and Fluffwood, for keener example, or even the Honeydew Basins from that time ago when peace was aplenty and Tim didn't breathe down my neck. And I could avoid him.

I trust that the sweet, gentle, sloping plains are still just as peaceful as they were when I'd gone there, with Vivi, and Zoey, and Jen, that time ago. Not so long... but long enough.

When I reach the grasses and flowers of Paradise, a miniature swarm of eyes follows me. They blink and register and already the body of a wet water mammal has collided against me; without any strength, I do nothing but crumble back. "Aa—aah! Llana, whoa! That's..." The saltwater accent cascades over me. I cough slightly. Yes, I suppose I need an inkling of rest. "Yes, you do not look good. We... were sure Tim'd bring you back, since he told Umbre and Espa that but... oh thank gosh... ohhh thank gosh."

Another pair of footsteps saunters on. My head had grown to the weight of a boulder and thus I don't pick it up to see who it is. "Yay, you haaave shown up! You wiiiilll see me leave you!" Oh—oh Burr. I choke on a sob. You're leaving now, aren't you. And I know I trust you and love you but—I will miss you, dear friend...

A fluffy swab of one hand or another compresses over my forehead. "Oh. Oh yeah. She's burning up. After we leave, you might wanna rest up in you-know-who's room. He's been talking, and oh my gosh never seen Vivi with such a jump in her step though I guess she was always like that before..." His eyes rub and glaze off of me. "Yes, you know."

My voice, still somehow containing that sliver of an accent, croaks. "Yes... I... I... I—I know..."

He smiles softer. "Yes you do, dear girl." With Burr's face this close, I almost feel as if Tim's dropped by again. Then the dear brown face winks and the timburr pulls back, waves a warm hand, and scampers off. Zoey stays beside me with her water dripping over me gently. Of course she stays; gratitude has never gone this abundant upon me.

"Ah! Hey! Vivi! Waitwait—wait! Don't spin off yet! Llana needs to lay on your back or something! She has to see Burr and Mina leave—they're not gonna come back for a mite handful of sunrises and this is real important!"

Zoey grapples onto the green back and plows me up as well, and we sit on top of the virizion together. I've never heard Vivi hum such a lively, bouncy tune—or any tune at all. Not under her lips, not anything. But here she is, murmuring to herself of sunshine and pocketed joys. She's... suddenly brimming with a happiness I'd never seen before from her.

For all I know, Kyo still grunts of the shadows pooling about us, but the fact that he's spoken at all, and to her, changes it. Other bodies, abler and stronger than mine, in this time most noticeably, gather about wherever the moving sway of Vivi's body has ended. Voices I easily pick out, deciphering by heart: Bay and his gentle, jolly banter; Espa and Umbre, heads leaned together, hers a mask of scorn filled with blooming joy, his gentle and swaying and so very sweet, and plagued with kisses for her; Vivi's own suddenly lighter drift; F's red-hot drawl; Zoey's, of course, seawater tone, at its basic point; Mina's diamond-cut grin and tongue; Burr, and he's singing. A great string of lines, punctured with holes of worry but filled again with joy, fizzy, wonderful, beautiful, warm, sunny joy.

And it begins to die out as a recognizable ring of "mmmm" fills. Like a hum, but the questioning sort follows. It's Quagsire.

In my feeble, stomach-over-back state, I'd like to comply that even then I caught the major drift of the messages given, speeches spoken. But I didn't, rather. I hear tones, I hear Vivi's heartbeat, Zoey's agitated breaths.

It's first silly and sloppy and settling down; Quagsire and his sweet, floppy self taking the stage. Then he must grow quieter, dimmer, serious, with truth and honor shining like metals. Speaking of where we've come, of me and Zoey and Lady Mun—the girl, the pastel colored girl—as well, and fanning off to each and every character I've united here, ending on Roland and that team we'd recruited.

Then his grand tone comes to a finale, and Burr and Mina strike poise again. And their banter blooms: sweet, like flowers, blowing off in the wind and carrying their jovial scents far and wide. And they talk and they kiss and they stutter and they laugh, just for the sheer joy of it.

Then the hugs. Warmth rippling among bodies. Smiles and shakes of hands and the hugs, tight, burly wrapping of muscles and joy binding entities as one. I would prefer to partake in this part, but my mind blows dizzy and it seems much safer not to.

And finally, Burr sings the start to a jolly ode, a rumble, a peace going off, and he and his girlfriend disperse into the entercards holding light together as one and the portal has become. It will be rather unstable now, shifting and most surely unable to hold up all that well, but then it will settle, then Burr and Mina will be okay, then we can apply our new Paradise into effect and feel safety.

The shadows sing above me, but I ignore them for once. Sweet bliss roils within me, and I feel content on Vivi's back. This is peace. I will be okay; we all will.

And it's all we can be.

**YAAAAYYYY Burr and Mina finally got to do their thiiingg! Hah... and then we see Tim at the beginning. Being his usual self. Of course. And.. well, yeah, all that great stuff. (hah, if you couldn't tell yes I am tired. It's only eleven at night but why am I so tired bleehehhhhh... I dunno. Got out of school. Life.) **

**Welp, I'm satisfied. They finally got to start up another Paradise, spread the cheer~ **

**Mina: Yeah but I'm stuck with blockhead over here.**

**Burr: Your back is beautiful anyways.**

**Mina: Shut up**

**Burr: but it is **

**Mina: BURR**

**Burr: I WANT TO KISS YOU**

**Mina: SHUT UP**

**Burr: nooooeeesss -tackles her- **

**Me: I ship them. xD**


	18. Steadily Patching and Groundrise

Chapter 18: Steadily Patching and Groundrise

_Painfully obvious I'd find myself wrapped within the sparkling entities of clouds so soon after Burr and Mina left—I must have easily collapsed into sleep. From Stella, I've had it easy to tell whether or not I'm dreaming, unintentionally adhering this lucid ability now, where I do know I have my head down at rest now._

_Soft, bubbly wisps of puff swirl about me. Their colors flick just out of my view, but the sparkling, celestial hold still charms me and my head sways betwixt the bejeweled sights. Wispy trickles whiz by me, nearly leaving streaks upon my scaled face. This all, of course, becomes unimportant when the first line of blackened smog trembles in, a glittering black sheen of pure—darkness, would it be? Icy-white particles stick through like needles._

_Pricking needles with the ability to end a life. _

_I just stand and wait and watch—a patchy, livid, wide-eyed, numb-faced watch. Supposedly I could do something: run away, investigate, attempt to demolish it with one of my various healing powers as a snivy; what do I do?—nothing. Stand; float; watch: nothing. Just... simply, the display intrigues me._

_I would most likely be safer to scuttle back from the growing masses, but I don't. Perhaps because I'm aware this is a dream, perhaps because in my head I imagine Stella striking down the substance like an astronomical superhero, which, in an odd sort of way, the fluffy one is. She does have celestial abilities, and, technically, can't die whatsoever. _

_Still I watch. The burbling, near-liquid fluid of oily dark clouds—going for cumulonimbus by the looks of it—reek: they reek of fear, and desperation, and—oh, pure, sickening desperation. The further blooming ones, puffing up in size and shape, easily swamping the size of my home in Paradise, begin to glow an odd assortment of colors: red; pink; white, even. The reds stick and give a slurred fall to where they fade to nothing. Something sticks in the back of my throat. I'd rather not wish to know what._

_The stench, a smattering of mildewy rain and chilled cold, a sheer cold spiking in my throat, sends frigid whispers of fears down my spine. I cough; I cough; the feelings don't subside, they can't subside, they won't subside._

_Yes... I should have run when I had the chance. With no other way to move other than shivering like this in place, the clouds buffet and swamp me, taking my body into their confines and further drilling into me. The needle-like spines of ice stick bloodied clots of pain that stab and shiver up and down me and the oily blackness travels up through my nose, my ears, my mouth, my eyes—_how does it get into my eyes? _A childish stroke of laughter seizes my heart in a tizzy._

_Who is that! Who is that! I can't scream but it bounces inside of me. I don't know I can't know I can't see, I can't see, I've gone practically blind. The rushing of the cumulonimbus monsters assures me even if I had run or attacked, this would always have been my end. Unable to escape, either way. Inside, I laugh. It's not like I could do anything else. _

_The childish stroke of glee joins mine. Then cold, icy eyes form like a pinprick of light just so far away. Wisps of white, tangled hair follow, outlining a midnight face and angular cheekbones. I don't find a smile, or a mouth, it must be so small. The expression only expands, and the eyes grow lighter, higher, closer, closer to me, until death breath reeks over my figure and I'm shaking and that thing—_thing—_is laughing alone and I don't know what to do even if I could do anything. I don't cry I don't scream I struggle. A silent struggle._

"_He  
_"_Will  
"Kill  
"You," assures the voice of a little girl._

"_He has to—it's in his nature. He will; they always do. They always kill the other one and that's you, and it will be fun. I will let him live; he will be my pet."_

_At the sound of pet, a burble of a pink cloud emerges beside the little girl. The little girl and her littler pet—a creature whose hollowed eyes procure no color, whose bloody face procures no expression, whose flowers on her backside no longer shine purple._

A stab in my heart sends me back to life, back to being awake; and there's a shadow covering me so I dodge aside quick a cry and roll down to the window just beyond my reach, may sunlight wash me anew. Auburn orbs, quaking as I pinch my arm to assure I am awake, whatever that thing was isn't here too, a wet, cold hand covers my own. A scream punctures my throat raw; I scrabble and claw and force my way back.

"Aw, geez, Llana! You scared me!" The accent—not a little, tiny, childish, evil girl. Seawater. "Well it's a good thing even though you did so much scrabbling with your hands, you're like immune to hurting other pokemon, eh?" River blue eyes twinkling upon the palette of a white face zone in on me above her muddy brown nose and dash of freckles. "A-aw... you look scared..." _Plopsh. _Zoey flings herself to the ground beside me and rubs herself next to me, entwining her moist, assuring, white, fluffy—not tangled with knots and blood: fluffy—fingers with mine that shake and twitch. "I remember it took you forever before you told us about your dreams with Munna. You don't have to tell me anything."

I shake my head. "No... that was before I really understood... we-well... who I am... I suppose."

Zoey murmurs a soft "ah" and cuddles me closer. She's my best friend beside me; the rate my heart stumbles begins to slow again.

"I... it... Munaah..." I'm sorry, dear girl, I don't know what else to call you—especially, of all times, now. "She was in it, but... not until the end—a-ah, let me start at the beginning, one moment..." I suck in a breath or so, try to catch my heart, feel it writhing inside of me, hold it close, warm it more.

"There were clouds. I couldn't quite see their colors—somehow—but they were nice, sparkling clouds. Then from the furthest point came the big, black, bulging ones. Dark, ice-filled, cumulonimbus monsters."

"Cumulonimbus," Zoey mumbles, giving the word a feel on her tongue. "Mm..." She shakes her soft head. Those long, dark, twisty ears, like oceans at midnight, comfortably rest beside her head and with one on my shoulder.

I give her a moment: or maybe it's myself. "I... was mesmerized by them, and stood and stared. And... they absolutely grew and consumed me. I was struck with cold chills and saw flashing colors... and... I think I saw Darkie." Zoey sneezes, squeaks, stuffs her head in my tiny shoulder, expanding into the yellow, leafy one and most indubitably leaving streaks of snot.

I love you, Zoey.

"Then..." _He Will Kill You. _Her words flash back violently in my eyes. "She told me Tim will kill me. 'He will kill you.' And she told me Tim would live, even though I died—even though we're forced into that connection. He would be her pet. And... then Munaah came stumbling in. She looked like a little pink cloud at first, but then I started recognizing features. It was... It was awful."

"Oh, Llana!" Her pierced cry seems about to shed tears.

"So... well... it's why I cried out and stumbled out of my bed..."

"Away from the shadows..."

"Yes, and into the sunlight. And your hand was cold like Darkie's breath and her hair was white and I flinched away and then I screamed. And now we're both pushed up against the wall as I attempt to recuperate."

"Yes, yes, indubitably... Oh, I'm so sorry you have to have all these ugly dreams!"

"Zoey, I'm okay... It's all I can be, and they are only dreams. Plus, I have you."

"ZOEY, WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN THERE?" _BAM, BAM_

She blinks, dumbfounded. "Oh yeah. It's like midday. I was gonna go on a Mystery Dungeon with F cuz she's awesome but I told her we should get some berries and a bag first. The pokemon we're gonna look for—F said he'd been passed out from hunger. You know, F and some of those team whoever guys find all the missing or whatever pokemon so she remembered this poor guy. Then you woke up and... yeah. Heheh." A cheeky grin splits her lips wide.

Elijah used to smile like that. I beam myself, softly, and nod, as Zoey removes herself from my side after a moment's hesitation, sifts through a barrel of items, finds herself a few plump berries, and with a wave, she leaves. Always been a bit of a softhearted scatterbrain; I smile on the inside too. Sure enough, I see, with a glance to my left, there are runny green stripes on my shoulder, from the slim green tip to its expanse of yellow afterword. I lick my fingers—dashing my head about to make sure no one is watching—and rub off the residue until my scales shine well enough again.

A hoof, cold and stuttered, clops down.

Didn't see him there just now, but my head bobs back up and the capricorn has wandered out of the room he always stayed in, now entering the one Zoey and the supplies and I all share together, the room that goes right out to the door:

it's Kyo. He ensconces into my bed, closest to him. Sunshine has begun to fall on my gently mussed hay, but now shadows begin to taint Zoey's as the day wears on. Of course; he chose the one without the blackened residue—another residue, a scarier one I'd rather not mix with either.

"Hello." Still hollow as it was when I first heard him, but it's voice. "Who are you again?" He doesn't look at me, but there's no one else in the room, so I mumble, "Llana."

A wait. "I like your soft accent, Llana." Hearing my name repeated back to me from that listless, emotionally drained whisper pelts me in the face, but I nod to myself, even if he can't see me. "Do you understand now? The shadows?"

Still talking. Especially—to me. "Yes." In... another way, ever since that time Tim had kissed me and I saw his flickering gaze and the depravity lying within: though I see now that he's toned in some areas, like my Sweethot is affecting him like he to me, I saw the shadows within him. And I still do. I've been seeing them for quite a time, and now I recognize it.

"I see why you hate them. I dislike them as well. I would rather... we did not have them."

A bobbling nod. The horn on his head glints a gentle sheen in the light provided. "Me too," he rasps, almost as if a child.

I nod again to myself. He speaks, softly, "It stopped ripping me apart, but it's so hard to grow back from where it hit me. It hit my heart... and it tore me apart. And it hurts. It hurts to grow back."

"It's all we can do," I whisper.

"It's all we can do," echoes Kyo. I still feel too afraid in my head—do not utter his name above all—and as well this creature is so broken—but... to see the beauty, even slight, of his recovery, after the agony Vivi spends over him, showering nothing but love and receiving nothing in return, it glints in my heart like his unicorn horn does here.

And he is recovering, so evident now. Vivi's joy easily provides this proof. Finally, I push the stray thorns of my dream into the back of my head, tuck away my own rips, and nod to myself. "Thank you for your time. I think I will go find the others now."

His sudden response jolts me—"Tell Vivi... tell her..." Kyo, here I see, struggling to pour out the words. My heart yearns for this ache in him: please, keldeo, you can say it. She loves you; she loves you. "Tell her she looks pretty." It's nothing much, but it will be everything and more to the virizion.

"I will."

Oh, cruel fate, twisting this boy and then his love, each of them out of shape. And even as Vivi begins pouring back into herself again—some broken things turn to new, and others recover this way, returning to the love and beauty she once held—Kyo, ever slower, starts his trickling as well. It's horrid, that the world would do this to such beautiful souls; and yet it does; oh, cruel, cruel fate.

Kyo, never stop recovering. It will be okay; it's all it can be; just continue your slow, slow regeneration.

My feet somehow manage to stand on their own, and with an arcing stretch to my back, I strut out of my home with one further glance to the keldeo whose eyes have begun the slightest glimmer in their hopeful stream of blue. A wooden _thuummp—creeaak _follows my exit of my humble, oak home.

Much of my team has already scattered: some perhaps to Mary and her inn, others to their own duties and Mystery Dungeons. It's been a time, even further than exploring the magical confines, simple exploration, since I've saved a pokemon in need of it. Last I did—Breezy Meadow, just prior, with Zoey and Burr and Mina and me, and we took down the zebstrika bloke that thought he could hide his criminal record of terrorizing and injuring in a grassy plain, even a Mystery Dungeon one: no. But further, I hardly recall any rescues: my last... it... Ah.

Just as I was recovering myself, but trying to hide my memories of Great Glacier and Elijah and others because they hurt still, I wasn't really recovering at all—but at that time... I recall...

"_Llana! Please stop sitting around and staring! Say something! I hate seeing you frozen like this—it hurts me, too, you know! It hurts us too!" _As the Sweethot, I guess I don't have desperation, but losing someone... shattered me for a time. Of course, it was impossible to forever be shattered, but would I have stayed that way did the gentle and wise nature-filled virizion never try at me time and time again? It may have taken longer.

Thank you, Vivi.

_Off we run, her eyes violet and slowly lightening to a paler lilac, opening up like budding flowers, as I spread out my arms and show her I can still run, I can still move, I'm not dying, Virizion. It just hurts so badly, like words can't even describe. "You're doing quite well, thank goodness," she sighs. I don't even know which Mystery Dungeon I'm in, but there's a humming singsong to it and the walls are painted the colors of sunsets other creatures never wanted to forget. And suddenly I don't want to forget them either: that one with the stab of pink, the one there with purple-white clouds nearly blotting the sun into a star shape, that with the view over a blood-tainted sea._

_I back away from that one. _

"_We're supposed to save a young one—a seel, somewhere down here."_

Oh, yes, I recall that... Vivi and myself—still Virizion back then, of course—gone off to rescue that tiny dear, the seel, that aquatic, white-skinned creature with slick waves riding down its back and the pecha pink tongue lolling out, not really in a peaceful stance but because it always does. The tears in its small, seed-black orbs, and the heaviness in my heart as I plucked the poor dear off the ground and hugged it close and it just wailed. Finding its mother again further away from the place rung pangs of joy in my heart. I never thought I could feel joy—but suddenly it sprang up and nabbed me.

"_Wow," mumbled the dewgong there with her baby in those frilled flippers, "you found my poor little rascal. I... never knew it was possible to get so worried—so freaking scared—for that little baby but oh, oh I was. Oh I was. Thank you. I was just trying to get to that Post Town place, settle the deals for my house and all that, and she goes and saunters off like she's the stromgest thing in the world. Her father's going to be so proud, the idiot," her voice suddenly filled with honey as she whispered, "but I guess I am a little proud too."_

A little proud, I reminisce, that the tot not only managed to scramble out into a Mystery Dungeon without anyone sighting her but had lived so long and done so well... Of course, Vivi and I were soon there to be sure it didn't die—what a tale I'm happy kept curtains in the end—but the amazement something so small still has such power inside its little bones...

Remembering, I flex the little bones in my fingers. Suppose it's time again to go and find someone else, and run off with them and rescue another being in need. As dangerous, and foreboding, and so new as the Mystery Dungeons are, and threats tend to thread around those areas, it's rather hard to die in there. The odd accumulation of magic and others of the sort filling every corridor and beyond assure that, and even as they're the most dangerous areas of Truught, when other pokemon come out to find your lost soul, you'll be okay, you'll live. The pokemon in those places wander and don't have minds or strengths and the casual injuries sometimes allotted from the strange places there are: none of it stands a chance in comparison to how quickly one's state of healthiness increases regularly and all of the goodies left on the ground.

Some are gentle like that, like with the seel.  
Other are Great Glaciers I'd rather not reminisce of so freely.

My gaze flicks over the ground; still, shadows are shadows, and here and there and everywhere are where they loiter. I suppose the light wouldn't look so bright though, if we didn't have them. I want Kyo to see that, how he's in light now as he sits in my bedding and falls into sleep again just as sunset begins, like every sunset, to assure his dreams wrap around such luminosity.

He just has to look and he can see, oh, he can see, just how bright and welcoming, and open, and gentle and kind and there, oh very there, that light is. And we're all here for him: Vivi most noticeably. We want him to grow from them.

Still, there are shadows. I step around the one nearly touching the board I'd helped F paint that time I thought it was smart to go into a Mystery Dungeon alone—now that I know who I am I would never go into one of those holes without someone else, and as well I prefer the company of others for the majority—and I'd gotten that sickness—the first showing of Sweethot in some ways perchance?—and I glimpse for the pine needles, as which areas they stick in determines where there are pokemon in need of something. Certain angles, certain points, provide clues whether or not one is for someone in need of help, or an outlaw, or someone who just wants a clean fight.

I usually don't do the clean fights. But once Mina somehow convinced me into it since _"aw, c'mon, girl! I can't do anything; at least you can heal! I'll go myself if you don't do it." _And therefore I went with Burr and Zoey and took on whatever creature it had been.

In my lonely stance, I imagine a yellow-furred creature with wings about his white arms reaching out to me, the black cap of fur about his head brushing in the wind as his ears twitch and those deep, dark orbs ask me to join. And of course I do.

The scattered rush of a few further off in the distance, to the upper-right—out in Bitter Springs, where the trees are so thick no sunlight shines through—show F's I-don't-care attitude for some faraway guys that want to fight. I search more for the left. Bottom left displays some flecked painting of first green trees, then varying from autumnal colors to pinks, to purples, to green again. And then shoreline and then nothing, the end of Truught. Pinks: some of those are in Fluffwood. Purples: some of those are with Sogwood Forest.

One carefully-placed pine needle, done with the sharper bit up to hint at anger, just in the edges of Fluffwood, must be an outlaw in hiding.

"Mm? Llana—mm, what're you doing over here? S'bout mmmidday... shouldn't you be in sommmee Mmmmmystery Dungeon at this time? Or recovering still? Hm?" A-ah, Quagsire. A floppy, blue hand trails over my back comfortably. He's here for me, of course, as he always is.

I watch over the little painted Dungeons on the wood below. "I'm feeling better. Wanted to go on a rescue trip. Sort of... drifted off in thought, I guess."

"Mm... mm, well, you could join Roland'n'mmmmme. We're lookin' for sommmmewhere too. Need to checkup on sommmme places. Hm—always gotta check. Wanna?"

The spine-colored green chespin comes trailing behind. His orange eyes ask the same question, his brown arms crossed, those small, sharp claws hidden for now. "Sure." I like him. As I did recover, I recall taking a trip or so with him, just looking about the Mystery Dungeons. He never says why, but sometimes he hums or so. I like Quagsire. He is one of us, even if he's usually traversing other lands far off or spending time with the beloved swanna.

"'Ey, looks like we got dat one all open. An' dere's uh blunt spine er anot'a' stickin' outta it." Roland draws a mud brown hand, then finger, over the map, and rests the tip on a rocky landscape beginning to swoon for the sky. Just in the shadows of those very-much life-threatening Crags of Lament, and even further in the shadow of Sunlit Dais, where... we'd left those Cobalion and Terrakion creeps to whatever the light gave them.

"Mm. Not bad." Quagsire's blue fingers join his. "Mmmmmm... wasn't that called... mm! Flowery Rockruse and Groundrise, right right." Flowery Rockruse and Groundrise... the rather long name strikes me funny. "I think Stella... mm... yeah, she nammmmmed it? Long time ago. Back with you'n'Gerald'n all that."

Of course it was her.  
That explains the odd wording.

The dark, cloudy, beady orbs watch as he plucks the pine needle. "Mm. On the blunt side. Looks like we'll save a little scout on the way—mm-hmm? All good with y'all?"

"Yep."

"Cool wi' me."

"And let us be off!" And behind the cheer-bound creature with the obscure past and name follow a pair of grass pokemon with a well-known and not-well-cared-for past behind their own selves, smiling slightly anyway even though they don't know much about each other. I guess this is a chance to do so. To hear more of Roland's slang tongue, hear more from him. He sticks to Jen most of his time, somewhat like I do Zoey—though I've seen that glint in his eye when he seeks out her, that one I can relate toward when I think of Elijah—so... this will be a chance.

Quagsire hums, as I'd guessed, and eventually I seek out Roland. He tells me of songs, of family, of a time when everything made sense and life seemed to balance, and of thunderstorms and turmoil and hurricanes and wrecks. And of a younger brother he's searching for. One that he—_will_—find. Alive. Olive is a liver, ain't never been a dier, he assures me.

We stroll down then onto the warmly worn dirt trail and traverse the rest of the way to a good swerve from the Crags of Lament and into the strange wreckage that leads into the maze below, Flowery Rockruse and Groundrise. There—yes—are flowers of a rainbow of colors, and some areas derive back from and to sunlight and open air, and there are many boulders and rocks. Some can be pushed, others crumble apart, and still more refuse to leave their posts, old guards forever encased to their duty, even after the world has changed this much.

Life is full of changes, but some of the changes... don't.

And others repair themselves. Roland will repair the family he has: he will find Olive and he will bring the tot into our care as he has with himself; Kyo and Vivi will repair their love and their lives prior to the darkness and shadows of the Bittercold's plight; and Quagsire will continue to hum, always hum, as if life has always been so sweet.

We do find the creature mewling in need of our help and rescue it and its sad, sniffling, tear-stained soul from the fear it had encased itself in. A feline. Gem on its forehead. Persian—right. Not a child, but not a full-blown adult yet either. Around... where I am. About to turn into its time of final growth, just on the edge.

But I refuse to evolve—and some of the changes don't.

Quagsire hums and Roland and I chatter and the persian who doesn't tell us his name sings softly as our jolly outbreak has caused him joy, and as well, he won't die just yet. No, he won't. We will always be okay: there's nothing else we can be.

Still, I avoid any shadows on the ground and skip past them.

**Haha. As you can tell, I threaded some stuff in you haven't seen before. Or just stuff from prior that I wanted to bring back again. A nice little memories chapter, haha... I never did write that scene with Vivi and Llana, like, in an actual chapter, that was basically stuff after PMD 1 and before PMD 2. When Llana was busy freaking out and still and just didn't know what to do with herself.**

**THANKS ELIJAH FOR DYING.**

**Welp, I guess this leads this chapter to an end. Paradise is actually in good shape. Yaaaayy~**


	19. The Calm

Chapter 19: The Calm...

_Jen_

Man, there's nothing like getting up to go out there with your friends and take down some big, burly jerk in a Mystery Dungeon. I'd almost forgotten how much it, like, releases your worries and fears and it's just you and the magic in those chambers, your buddies beside you and an enemy to net. Also, I'd never been to Fluffwood before—this real fluffy place, I swear, almost every single tree was pink with it. Ember said he'd help me round there if I needed it, though. He's a real nice guy.

Me and Ember and Gurdurr and Vivi. Gurdurr, he said he didn't get out enough and this was his perfect chance to pump his muscles and all that. Plus, I'd heard F was going out too, and they don't always go out so it was perfect timing. And then Vivi... wow, her cream legs just move. She has a lot of energy to burn or something. Nah, she just looks happy. Those violet orbs spin full of energy and probably joy, too. She also got the biggest chunks of damage on that big, purple dragon guy—hydreigon. Yeah, her. Those things are kinda scary, so I keep forgetting that I actually have dragon moves too that I can counter with it—I'm afraid to say I've gotten a little clumsy and rash after I stopped stuttering.

It's cool to be more confident, but I also stumble around a lot. And I'm more confident, but not that confident. I don't pay enough attention like I used to. I guess I'm getting a bit too confident in myself. But I guess that was bound to happen if I ever wanted to lose that stutter and open up to my friends. I've never really had anyone prior to these buddies, and that's okay. I have them now, and I don't really plan on leaving them.

Now I'm just further out in our home, in Paradise, and I'm sitting on one of those musty logs, and I'm staring down into a patch of water. Further out, there are a lot of puddles. Zoey usually accompanies me, but I think she was busy trying to get food into a pokemon that really hadn't eaten in awhile and F was trying to help her.

Probably since it's kind of wet and always puddle-filled, this area isn't always noticed. But right now, as the sun goes down, all the puddles have bits of sun and sky in them. I get up, find myself a sharp stick, and start poking random puddles to see the waves ripple on them.

Back before Burr and Mina left for making that new Paradise—oh geez, I'd never have the courage to do something as insane as that—back before Mina wanted to open up to anyone because she'd just showed up after going missing and Burr didn't want anyone near her—and she'd been shy like me—back then we'd spent times here. She told me a lot about who she was and stuff. I told her about myself, but there's not much in that area: born from an egg with no one nearby whatsoever, just sort of abandoned, then I ran to Forest Grotto and lived there since. Some passerby pokemon clamoring through the Dungeon would think I was one of those fake pokemon the places offer and tried to beat me up—bad mistake.

We've both learned to really open up—for me the first time—for her... again. After she'd gotten that scar and ran from Gurdurr and his crew and her boyfriend and... Tim... when he was... better, I guess, and she closed up, and she came back and opened again. Mina, though, that mienfoo is definitely one of my best friends. We spent a lot of time being quiet together here, and then a lot more time being open too. And when she found her voice, her will to live, she really became this cool, glitzy creature. I am quite proud to have her by my side. She's cool—a lot more than cool, but I'm not all too good with words, so I'll leave it there.

While I poke my stick in the waters and watch the ripples be pretty, my mind just keeps on ambling around Mina. Her bright yellow face, and her proudly-puffed-out yellow chest, and the magenta streaks of her arms and legs, all colorful and stuff. And I remember—she had a sister, just like how brotherly Tim and Burr get she had another part of her, once, and I remember other stuff too.

But it's all stuff she told me so she could get it out. She doesn't like remembering it, but I think about her weird life a lot more than she'd think. Her scar, too. It's not really that bad, she still looks pretty, but that scar really did it for her.

I wish I could talk to her right now. When we met and flocked to each other because of our shyness and quiet fear to open up, and then when we did and she was so glitzy and I was so bold in some ways, but cowardly in others, and my rashness and all that. But... I remember that chespin, Roland, he lived in a Mystery Dungeon like me, only he had a big family and the Dungeon collapsed and they all died but he escaped and he knows his little brother did.

Roland said he likes my voice. It makes me happy to know he'd never had to hear it when it was all broken and twisted with ugly stutters, like my own scars. Mina's learned how to rock that scar; I've done away with mine. I trot on and let my braids fall into my eyes, my hands dangle and trace all the bumps in the triplets in my hair.

Then I let go of my stick and sit down.

Then I use those claws of mine to gently pull out each braid, mash all my hair together, then I separate and braid each section again. I like to do that when there's still a sunset out, so that my silvery hair blocks out some of the pretty lights while others collect over my face and eyes. They're... nice. This is nice.

Jen, stop thinking of Mina.

Stop picturing her. I'm sure she's thinking of you, too—now stop it. Of course, thoughts of my best friend continue to fly around like they can do anything they want and don't care about this new ache in my heart just because I want to see her so badly now it's like I got a claw from my buddy Strike—a really powerful black-furred houndoom with fire in her maw and wisdom in her not-scarred-out eye—and I shoved it into my stomach. Houndoom claws, now those sting.

I end up quickly braiding my hair back without really noticing if those disgusting bumps got in. I'll fix it later or something. My mind springs back to that one guy—he was aquamarine and looked like his eyes would stab me to death—whose name I think was... Tilde? Maybe? Or Talon. Yeah, I think it's Talon. But either way Bay'd told us about how that guy was keeping tabs on everyone even while we're out in Mystery Dungeons or near the wreck area of the Great Glacier of all things, and so he'll be able to tell me about Mina. I can go to him, and then I can pester him until he tells me what's up with her, and then I'll feel better.

Scampering up off the ground, tossing my braids and stick behind, I run for the other edge of Paradise with my eyes streaming and cyan little fists furled. I'll find him and I'll make sure I get an answer of how my best friend and my best friend's boyfriend are doing. They have to be okay, I know, but I need, like, details. And he—will—give—me—those—details. I smile slightly.

With my huge, pointy feet flatly pumping soil, I get to that funny gray tent they're using for a headquarters as Gurdurr works around and finishes that wooden wing for our home area. We're collecting stuff as we go through Dungeons, so that'll supply the burly, fluffy cloud man. He looks a little like one, at least—I tried. Well, back in Fluffwood, Vivi insisted we collect some of the furry stuff on trees and leaves, and we'd gotten a lot of sticks too. He'll do well.

And finally, I burst into the tent area. Well, nearly. The felt door's been zipped tight shut. My head bonks against nothing but felt and I lose my footing and fall hard on my rump. Turning my head back and forth, I don't really see anything but the forest area and a little bit of a field around me, so no one saw that. Did anyone notice? Or maybe they like their privacy.

Well, privacy doesn't matter when your best friend is in your mind. "Let me in!" goes my high-pitched squeak. "Come on! Please!"

There's no response. What—do they have something against a girl that needs to hear something, anything, from the girl she loves most? _Let me see my best friend—_let me _in! _

_Thunk! _Ooh. Something is in there. "Please let me in! I need to... I need to hear from my best friend... I know it's kind of early but I miss her and you understand that don't you? You have an entire team of pokemon that are your friends, and if one was connected to me you'd want me to show you them, wouldn't you? So please, please let me in! I promise I won't be bothersome! I promise I'll be nice and kind and everything, and I won't be mean if you can't get a signal or you're tired!"

It's torture crying out at the gray flap, but no one answers. Not a whisper. "Wow, are you guys really good sleepers? Or... no! Please don't ignore me!"

_SPLAT—thhkk...thhhkkk..._

_skkshhhh... skshhhh..._

The gray flap is not gray anymore. It's... a very livid red. Very, very livid red. My stomach curls. I wish my nose was smaller so I could plug it. Feelings—bad ones—come awash over me. Something squishes. A rancid smell—and the flap—emerge outward.

_Sshhhhhhhk—KKKSH! _Something very hot and yet cold goes up in my throat. It doesn't cut far, but I don't think it notices—dragon scales are a thing I have never been so very very very thankful for in my entire life. Sure, blood's welling up and staining my scales, and it just looks like a lot.

I should probably fall down now. So I do. _Ssskshhh—squieeshh! _Me hitting the grass, pretending to look dead.

The footsteps, thick and big and gray, trod past. Is that... Gurdurr? No, no, it can't be. It's a darker gray. And I don't think his footsteps are that small. It's someone else. Someone... Oh. Right. Tim. Yeah. Probably.

That thick face comes down on me. His black eyes stare at my—at least I think—unmoving orange orbs. "Ah. You won't last much longer. Good... I'd rather no one saw me." His maw splits into this little grin. A giggle falls out. His eyes darken, grin widens. The laugh grows deeper, stronger, I'm freaking out on the inside it's my heart—ow ow ow ow. "What, that?" The laugh is all I hear. "I had to stop them. How else can I isolate Llana? Now I can stop those of your friends taking over that new Paradise and... then there will be less of you."

He's going to kill Burr and Mina. Like how he... uh... killed me. Yep, I'm dead. I'm totally dead PLEASE STOP STARING AT ME TIM IT'S SCARY. And...

Mina. He's going to kill my best friend.

He's going  
to kill  
my best friend:  
Mina.  
No you can't do that no. No no no. NO! Don't do that! I won't... I won't...

I have to play dead or he'll kill me and I won't get my chance. My eyes are drying up I can feel it but I can't blink I have to pretend to die.

Mina's told me many things. She told me Tim is like a brother to her and the same goes with him to her; and Burr's like his brother to him. And now he's going to kill them. He's... going to kill the pokemon he loves... just because they're part of this team, because they're part of Paradise—why? Why does he want to kill us so badly?

Yeah, Llana's the Sweethot but... what's... what's wrong with Tim? Lady Munaah died ages ago. And that darkrai wisp girl—Darkie—she's gone as well. What's up with that guy? Why does he want to kill his closest loved ones like this? Why is he killing in the first place?

His footsteps recede. I should get up soon.

_THWACK! _Wood—his log—arced into my skull now. Spots blur and throb and my hands are numb. I don't think I'm getting up soon...

"You think I didn't notice? That should keep your stubborn dragon soul down for now..." are the last words that trickle in my ear as the fog in my eyes, head, heart, everywhere, it consumes.

_Llana_

Lying there, the grasses whistling in winds beneath my back on the plain, I stare up numbly at the clouds. The sky, patchy with nary a cloud at all, upholds one single tiny white puff, its figure stretching as it rides the blue bowl above to destiny, to fate, wherever clouds in the sky go. My tail curls from beneath me, its leafy tips on the edges of blocking out my vision. I just sit. A numb sit.

Mina and Burr, we've been assured, are safe, their heartbeats kept, but now it seems the bagon, Jen, has gone amiss. Still, Relna—that quiet, blue, muscular golurk thankfully reminded me of her name—tells us that from the tent Gurdurr provided, the meowstic—Talmon—and the hitmonlee—Brutus—have assured this numerous times. Wherever Jen is, she hasn't been injured; the glitzy mienfoo and her boyfriend are under way where they are, understanding what their mission is and building from it.

Safety wraps upon us.

Bay's words once more come back to me: _We're like... carefully molding a safety in place. So that Tim can't get in. _Now... we're... all... safe. Every last soul has been tabbed and we're all finally safe. He can't hurt any one of us now. He can't; he truly can't.

As I lie there, head rested upon green fronds, back rested upon green fronds, eyes in the sky, arms splayed lightly to my sides, my fingers stir up the bits of grass beneath open palms. I smile in remembrance of that first day, when Zoey and I had first met and slept on the cold, hard, orange dirt of Paradise, prior to meeting Gurdurr. My mind pans out like a map.

Here I remain in the same position, motionless, on one of the numerous clearings—each spilling further with a rainbow of flowers—that tend to come from open splotches of forest here and there. More flowers; they're practically the grass alone, their own sort of pathway instead. And of course, we have a watering hole, and a lake and... those water falls on the cliff area... where Tim has kissed me and send my mind reeling and I felt the debauchery on his lips—though he has learned and he has toned down, that moment I knew I don't want this boy; he scares me.

There's this one area Zoey's told me about, filled with puddles, where she and Jen sometimes spend days tossing their differentiating blue bodies into the water, tails flickering excitedly as the dive goes in. She's told me how much the bagon's silvery braids remind herself of her night-blue ears and their own lengths.

I smile with that girl's grin in my head, that cheeky one she flashed me immediately sending me over with thoughts of him: of Elijah. Everything seems to remind me of him now. I do love him, and that can't change, even if he's dead now. He's in my heart; he always will be.

Tim can't destroy that; he can't destroy anything now.

Again, I smile to myself and giggle the softest retort. We're okay. These clearings, these forests, these water-filled areas and that one station with an icy slide of sorts—everything is safe.

Squishy footprints sound on their way to me. First muffled, then thrumming, then they drop to not a pair but another, with what must be hands scrabbling with the squishes. Then a body, slamming next to mine and rolling over like me. A hand reaches out, grabs mine. Her heartbeat eradicates from her throat at an alarming pace until she swallows it down and waits to recover.

As Zoey sits there, I sit there too. Her river-blue ovals catch my yellow-ringed auburn, and she nearly bursts to giggles. But her heart jumps, and she waits.

The moment arrives. "We found Jen."

"A-ah..." I struggle to hold it back, but a slight response triggers. For a number of sunrises she'd been missing; here the bagon is now. Okay; okay; okay; she's okay. Indubitably; she's okay. Of course she is, Brutus said so—said Relna. And the golurk, that silent soul, it's all we can do to trust her.

"Tim got in."

What—no. No, he didn't. Zoey, you're... you're... I could never accuse that naïve, childish girl of lying to me. The words stick to my throat, never to be recovered. Already I feel my heart swell and suck in my lungs.

"He knocked her unconscious. Really bad. But she's okay now, she found her way back.  
"Talmon and Brutus are dead.  
"He killed them.  
Relna... that golurk girl... I don't know where she is...  
But she lied."

_We're like... carefully molding a safety in place. So that Tim can't get in._

What is that supposed to mean? My brain numbly flips over. What... what is that supposed to mean?

_We're like... carefully molding a safety in place. So that Tim can't get in.  
We're like... carefully molding a safety in place. So that Tim can't get in.  
We're like... carefully molding a safety in place. So that Tim can't get in.  
We're like... carefully—_no. It's not. It's all falling apart and it's supposed to be a carefully molded safety. So that he—can't—get—in. What did he do?—exactly that. Exactly... that...

Zoey's arms have wrapped about me, her head over mine and... the tears ruin my scaled cheeks, slide over them. I'm trusting too easily, spreading too open... letting him in...

I want him... gone. I. Want. Him. Gone. My fingers curl around the oshawott's body; I want him gone. Gone gone gone... don't hurt them... don't hurt them...

"And... Jen... when she woke, she told us he was running on his own to the new Paradise that Burr and Mina are crafting. He's going to..." A strong, held-in sob shatters through. "..._kill...them..." _And her cries burst past and take me as I lose myself into my best friend's voice and the cries cutting off of the seawater whisper.

My heart pumps, veins surge—we can't sit here and let them die we need to: a single thought collects inside of me.

Those entercards.

"_Llana, seriously, dear, stop looking at them like that! I told you, give them a few more sunrises and they'll be ready," Espa murmurs sweetly. "Besides, the longer they take, the longer I'm making myself and Umbre stay far—far away from the Mystery Dungeons. You know, have to watch over these. As well, I don't want to lose him... you know..." _

I'm afraid I can't wait for them to be stable. "Zoey..." My own rasp is piteous, but I have to tell her.

Her tear-stained orbs take a glance at my tear-stained orbs and the tracks gliding down. "Do you think..."

"I'm... me. I can't... I can't die unless Tim..."

A sniffle; a hug wrapping about me; _sniff, sniff. _"I... uuh... I trust you..." And she falls back. "I... I trust you. I love you."

"I love you," I rasp back in the same, pained whisper.

And with those droplets cascading down, my feet rippling over flowers and grass and around trees and shades and over puddles and down the rare bit of snow: I go. I push and shove and run and the tears fall hard like bombs, detonating with each step, exploding on impact, they are left behind and watch me run on, across the entirety of the flowers and grass and trees and—I must find them. They're... not... allowed... to _die. _

Eventually I even stumble past the lilac-furred Espa with her orbs peering upon me and then they widen because she sees me going for the winking about of bright, white energy just in front and she knows what I'm doing as well. "Llana! It's not safe!"

"It's safe enough," I throw back. "For me... it's fine. Only the Bittercold can kill—"

"But she's... a-ah." Not a she. Not a she.

I've let them know now why we must bind against Tim. It's finally, truly, out there.

I let them know. Another bomb drops from my eyes as I plunge into the watery white light and feel its cool rush against me and the sting and pull and shoving winding tugging—need to be brought in. Sucking me, pulling me, taking me: in. Into its torrent and I have to, it's not fully adjusted but how else can I save them?

How else can we save them?

I struggle to wave back at the espeon who watches with her own bombs quietly detonating with each fall. She mouths words of kindness over the rush of the wind, of the storm, billowing about me now.

I whisper them back.

**Yep. Yepyep. Tim does not know how to quit. Stubborn bum. **

**Tim: -_- I love her. Can't you understand that? Let me take her—let me kill them all so that she's the only one left and I have her all to myself.**

**Me: STUBBORN BUUUMMMM -smacks him-**

**Tim: ._.ll **

**Elijah: She was mine in the first place you weirdo -sticks out tongue-**

**Tim: I'm better for her**

**Elijah: YOU KILLED ME JUST BECAUSE I LOVE HER AND SHE LOVES ME**

**Me: he has a point guys. JEALOUS STUBBORN BUM.**


	20. before the Storm

Chapter 20: ...before the Storm

Sizzling. Burning. Fluids arcing up my scales. I cough; I cough; something burns; I singe. My eyes must spark something red-hot. Fiery. Painfully bright. I lock them shut again. Muscles beneath me flex, pull, cord and knit as one then expand to nothing. It hurts to move. Thus I don't, until I crash.

It's one heck of a crash. I'm sent reeling; generated light energy shocks me. Cartwheels form out of my uprooted limbs and a somersault catches me better than any soul could. Plumes of dirt come smacking about and scratches begin to bleed—to ache. I cough again, just for good measure. Sticky, metallic tangs clash with my mouth; a stream burbles from my lips. A deep scarlet, thicker than Ember's whorl of red hair and darker as well, slides out.

That was a bad idea. I don't move, but my heart bobbles a tune that could be sympathy—I doubt it, though. Strings play inside of me; just that need, _need, _to find those souls and save them.

Tim's had a handful of extra sunrises, reminds a voice in my head.

But he he had to run all the way over here, on a path we've always required entercards, reminds another. We'll be okay. There's a chance; chances cling to me like luck, like the glimmer on my scales. The Sweethot seems to be quite the lucky sort of creature as it is. How I've already saved however many teammates from this demise I'm saving again—Zoey, Jen, Ember, Cheeka, Umbre, even Espa—and now to expand for Mina and Burr. I guess that makes me lucky, to already have the one accumulation stored safely, put home and safe like the stars resting in the sky, which I notice have arrived already—how long did that trip take for me?

Too long, goes the first voice in my head, too long.

The other snorts. I can hardly tell which of them is me, until I recall with a string of redemption that they both are. Each voice festers like a wound over me, worrying, fretting, they—need—to—live. They can't... _die—_nothat'simpossible. No, that's impossible.

I swallow.

It won't happen. I shove it back like a thorn from a bush, like my arm outstretched with a miraculously painless allot of red-beaded scratches that hardly ache, as it unfurls and cramps out and forms a clasp able to touch the piece of permafrost lying shapelessly in front of me, dizzily, as I use that leverage and move and crawl and unfurl my entirety of my body, tail to feet to stomach to chest, to neck, to head, and spill outward and stand.

Somehow, I stand. My toes, mussed and tousled with brown spots of dirt, the grainy, silty substance below me, poke out from under my slim, small frame. Small even compared to my fellow oshawott—I smile in thought of her.

Maybe she's feeling better now.

Stars poke out above me, so some time has passed since I bumbled my way into that unstable entercard adaption, but there was absolutely no other way if I—if we—wanted to save those beloved fighting type creatures of girlfriend and boyfriend.

In Paradise, we have that strong, mutual closeness to one another, and I feel as if one soul slipping away will cut me. Though as the Sweethot, any soul at all in slippage hurts with a terrible, sore ache, so it only allots further for me. Therefore they must live. Tim could not possibly have killed them; I know quite well, like a repetitive mashing in my mind, how strongly he feels Burr is as a brother and Mina as a sister. Their closeness: their connection beneath the curly-haired Gurdurr.

Brushing away the crumbs, my tired eyes cave into surveying my new habitat. I think of it, and, yes, once I recover the beloved mienfoo and timburr, I will stay with them and help finish the job. Their job... ours, to create these pockets of joy so that they can spread and return color to whitewashed lives of black and white and too many shades of gray that should all dissolve into bright color once more.

We will do that; I will find them.

My heart calms. The ice hanging out further away from me, those grooves, like the teeth of a legend hanging out in the sky, its maw outstretched and impossibly wide, impossible for most but a legend, seems to wink at me—assurance? Whatever could be exploited from the notion is. Again, my heart sits itself down gently and slinks into a cool, refreshing reverie.

Turning round, I begin to take in the great coldness standing like an old soldier straight behind me, noticeably built into a shape my eyes, not even teasing but as they adjust staring boldly, brightly, and then fearfully, into the folding build of what could be a shattered dragon. Wings, a maw as the entrance, its tonsils behind easily the entercards and their swirling volume of light.

Here though, I don't feel the pressurized ice cracking into my skull: it's calm. Quiet. Cool—very quiet, yes, quite.

Too quiet, just about.

I glance again at my small section of silty brown soil, turning around to see the frozen waves of ice, of cold, broken ice, behind. Turning back around to face ahead, I can see the slight patches of silty brown poking through, but most every portion is solid permafrost, and the rise of icebergs—glaciers. I must be near that sludgy, underground entrance to the Great Glacier... somewhere amok. I could take a handful of steps in one direction or another and soon tread over pure, gliding, glittering white ice.

It practically appears to be consuming the plain ground, to never be seen again by naked eye but forever entranced in the numbing stick of the chill. I give another sweep about the area I've come to—the tooth-like cracks of rising, mountainous ice, the cold breath of air tracing down and fogging in here, not even specifically one spot but collecting everywhere, and those ribbons of color, of light.

The auroras in the sky from the cooler climate shimmer every which way they feel the need to move, mixing into one with others and blooming and shrinking and simply being. They live life as it comes; my mind quickly pinpoints Bay from how the abiotic factors work: kind, a smile tracing over his lips in most every occasion, happy-go-lucky.

Then I shake off thoughts of my dear friends and focus again on the ones that need me. Time seemed to slow as I navigated about where I stand and woke from my entercard-filled torpor, but my strength tingles just out of reach. The stars wink at me from above.

Finally, a pale-scaled foot lifts and touches slippery cool sheet. The polar mobs upon my skin, quickly adapting and morphing with my coldblooded body. I sneeze. May this work long enough prior to me losing... too much body heat. If only Zoey was Sweethot like me, or Stella took one of her random stellar showings as she tends to do: where has she been? Ever since the Great Glacier—the Glacial Palace, now with its ramparts glued together all the careful by Mina and Burr—and when she lost her mortal self but not immortal soul to this plane of space, I have only seen my white-furred fluffy one in my dreams.

Instinctively, reminiscing on my easily-forgotten crystal, my fingers thread around the clear stone necklace and I think of the fluffy one's own purple one which must lie around her neck now. Twins: close enough to.

I suck in a breath of cold air, set my other foot on the permafrost ground, and walk with an aura of power in my step—of this mutant—of who I am—through the sharpened teeth, the maw, the entrance of this new Paradise. Already I can find the musty scent of hay and as well, a rainbow of fabrics and felts fill the gently-remade cubes of chambers in this home so that pokemon and other creatures planning to become members and live here have warmth. The great, multifarious assortment even assures coldblooded reptiles like myself a way to stay cozy. As I have yet to see any of those members—or the ones that crafted this place—I awkwardly reach back and pull a lemony yellow blanket from the heaps lying about, draping it around me.

The Bittercold is the color of ice.  
Sweethot tends to take the yellow substance I've seen... back when the Great Glacier was over and Ember and Cheeka told me I had to die, because the desperate—not Bittercold—pastel-colored ghost was very much not alive, and I couldn't live with her dead or I'd go insane, and this sort of honey yellow collected.

Elijah saved me, of course; my heart warms at the thought. He saved me from my own thawing emotions after what had happened; I had to recover, had to find my friends... we rely upon one another, my dears from Paradise and myself as well. He reminded—reminds—me of this.

How I wish the emolga had lived.

And again I'm moving. My soft, hint-of-royal tone soon slivers through: "Burr?" The regal cry bounces in the frigid cubes of homes, with their intriguing shapes. I pass one supply room, another, each brimming with berries. Sighting the roughly-shaped but bright substances gives my belly a reason to yowl, so I quickly grasp a pair of the sweet-smelling blue ones—oran; so abundant but so sweet; I still prefer aspear, but whatever does, does—and pop their sticky, ovular surfaces into my mouth. The pangs end, my hunger ceases; the world shapes rightly again.

With a content sigh—and I'm off. Gentle movements, the yellow felt comforting me, wrapped about my small, stubby body. "Mina?" asks the royal whisper. "Miiiiiinaaaaa..? Are you there? Burr? Buuuurr_rrr_rr_rrr!"_

Then I recall how there may be recruited creatures I've just woken, ones with wide, bright eyes like Burr's when we'd first brought the warm, fluffy brownie in with us, and he'd seen my hope and he and Tim—before we knew how... crazy, as he'd call it, he is—had combined, and Gurdurr was shown the light as well.

There are creatures like that, and they may be resting here now. "U-um..." I shake myself; don't go to silence again. That was Llana prior to her realization, before I'd unearthed who I am and began to finally, truly understand and grasp it. Now I have harnessed some of the mutant sort-of power vested within my soul, and I do connect with others: yes. I should speak out. "Hello? Is anyone... there? M-my"—I silently bite the stutter—"dear—u-um! friends—you've heard of them—are they around here at this time?"

Silence. Cold, situated silence, welcoming my stutter. I shake again. "If you're out there... my name is Llana. You may have heard of me prior. I do you no harm—it's impossible for me to harm another creature. I would like... to talk with you? If you're out there?" Still gelid nothing buffets me.

Ah—Mina and Burr, Mary had told us, the gentle swanna, that they'd have to find and wrangle the creatures she'd hooked us up unto. Those spots of joy will be revealed, uncovered, once they're brought in. But that time is not now, not yet. And that must be where my dear ones have gone: searching for them. With Paradise set up here, all Mina and Burr would have to do is find those new creatures to bound as one, as I have with my own friends, and seal their group, and... that is where they are now.

I finish my albeit panicked stroll throughout the icy—though soon-homey—confines of the new Paradise and emerge out of the coiled staircase that leads down and into more permafrost: outward from the tail. On this side of the prettily-done, white-sloped and shaped creations of snow displays lumps and hoops of ice and snow melding together to work about the aurora and night sky shimmering down. Sloping hills and even the more-so-common patches of grasses—cold but true grasses—summon themselves, and a network of flowers rounds out the landscape out as well.

Rubbing the blanket over my face, breathing into its confines and wiping its warmth amongst me, I deliberate that the tundra is an underrated home, but also calming with a fine, quaint, understated fashion that sneaks up upon one and hugs them warmly. Yes—there is warmth in the cold biome. There is warmth.

Somewhere in this plentiful but not overwhelming mesh of crafts and surely the esoteric magic of Mystery Dungeons lay Mina and Burr. And that is what I intend to do:

find them.

Tim... he couldn't possibly have caught them first—not even as I look over and see fresh tracks of footprints spirited on, crushing the pair of individuals made first and the latest, covering the first, are red.

Nope nope I cover my face with the blanket and run and trip and fall and get back up and the cycle repeats until I can safely confirm that it'll be okay again. It's just... Tim's blood.

He does this. We're okay. I remove the yellow cloth from its tugging over my pointed nose and tumble out a sigh. My mind wanders: what will happen if... if they are injured—severely or not? Torn to nothing but sickening droplets of globules... Would I last if I laid eyes on that—or would I fall? Would I... lose... it? Like when Elijah—he—

No. Don't even picture it. They—must—be—safe. There is nothing else they can be but okay because in the end everyone is okay, no matter what it is. My lungs suck in painfully oversized pockets of air and I have to stop and think again for a moment before scrabbling on. The footprints—the pair of one and another—of Burr and Mina—dwarfed underneath Tim's great bases of his body smacking upon snow, upon them, don't matter.

It's almost like a message—but it's not. I won't let such message... be delivered. In any way. I know I can't fight but I could throw myself in front of them, in front of Burr and Mina and keep Tim from attacking like I'm their guard, and I know well he wouldn't dare attack me.

I thought he wouldn't hurt his close-enough-to-siblings dear ones, but it appears nothing grows in his way but myself, only because I'm on the same level as him: we both hold that mutant energy inside of us, crafting us, using us—and we can use it but I feel as if I'm the true scapegogoat in such relationship. We are the ones used against our own selves instead of ever complete control.

And as I run, the yellow fabric draped about me, I deliberate that if I find a tall, brown-furred carcass bloodied and mussed in the snow, alongside the pink-and-yellow counterpart, I will lose it: I do not have control and I feel my... power... surging in my veins, and I understand that whatever becomes of me shall include the blow of energy—harmless energy, the reason I'm invalid with harming another now—and... it might hurt.

It might sting.

It might be... bad. I use the tiny term lightly, but the ache of its whisper funnels through me, and it ripples and absorbs and shakes and tears. I glance over at the droplet of red now tainting my yellow fabric and sense that the energy has gone too voraciously into me, easily shredding into my arms and thus disturbing the beads of blood hanging on inside of them, disposing the dye which must now tread down my pale scales and change the sheen to red.

There is nothing else I can do but continue moving—though, in a sense, I could stop and roll about in the snow and attempt to dispose of this blood: but to stop would be to allow weakness in, and giving myself this submission could derail from me later and... Tim could have already killed them, I don't know—why is this pathway so long?

I shrink back from the possibilities spiraling out of orbit—out of my control—take a step or so back, and run again. My breath pants with my tired worries, with the streaming Sweethot inside of me. As I do, it almost feels as if I'm stepping into a time-line prior; I'm shooting back with space and seeing the past. I used to run roads like these with my uncle, Gerald, the larger, greener, darker-colored snivy; I've always been so light. Now I know why.

After him was finding Zoey, losing Stella—who always hovered about us and him as well quite a flurry of times. I was alone until the oshawott scuttled into my life.

But I delve deeper: past what I'd done and closer to... how it woke. The power in me. Perchance Tim had appeared so... peaceful... until he realized our connection, even prior to my own noticing, and he smashed into his true form, into the Bittercold he is. And thus he had the... the...

I swallow.

...the lust in him to look at me like so and to think he was... so... powerful, could do what he wanted, and though we've stopped he practically _can _do what he feels like. But still I had not woken. I could fight, just the slightest, use a few vines, a few leaves; the remembrance trickles into my soul but no battle techniques come out, as they never will again.

There had been that neutral, rushing time... I recall losing consciousness an assortment of moments, scattered like rocks on a smooth wooden floor—Tim's aura had already festered and grown onto him, and mine was still yet to come; I still hadn't grown into the one I'm supposed to be, and it's that black aura that tripped me up repeatedly. I also... didn't have the confidence in myself—because I missed a piece of me, even though I didn't realize.

Here I am now: change has revealed with a thunderous strike what else lies before me, inside of me, even behind me. Auburn orbs churning upward with the clouds out in orbit, I see I've veered a sharp right in my wandering and against numerous white hillocks, I've found a cavernous, gaping opening. Icicles spear down like they already sense me and their kill orders have powered on.

It's impossible, but still I shiver. Some things don't have to be possible to still chill one to the bone and further, even; further. Kyo's name etches across my eyes. "A-ah... Burr? Burr, are you there?" I don't allow myself any other glances to the trail as I come up to the deep, dark, cold blues swamping me and much light as well. Just as when I'd gone into Tim's ice clouds, there seems to be a coating protecting me. I sniffle; polar air drives up my nose in a massive cold heap.

"B-burr? Please..." My whisper, soft and shivering and royal, bounces back to me. Soon I discover how shallow the cave is and follow the darkness looming forward until I stumble upon something sticky, and slick, and yes there's the brown.

"BURR!" No response. None. Nothing at all. It rips from my lips and suddenly I've been opened up like a stopped bottle of berry juice and it flows like liquor inside of me: "Burr wake up Burr Burr open your eyes it's bright out I'm here what are... what... wh-wh...why are you..." And I smash against the ground.

Right up to the brown face, the black eyes, my throat tightens and so does my stomach and tears... tears. They've frozen in place; his ridiculous amount of blood flow has frozen in place; he's not getting up again. Nevermore... never... ever... ever... I want to sit and cry and die and lose it all, cry until nothing but the cold numbness I've froze myself into can stop me—but I just lie there.

Stupid, stupid; I lie there. If tears come, they slick up to me. Burr's hand, bent haplessly to the side, tugs into my fingers and I press his fingers against my head, just the softest: like he used to. I try to pretend he'll be okay and he'll wake up and remember me and the wounds aren't deep, but they are, and he's been flayed open, and Tim knew what he was doing.

Then my eyes shift, and I see the other set of footprints. I can just imagine it.

_Tim catching up, the black-furred monster he'd once called a brother now bounding up to him with red in his hands and a smirk draped across his expression. "Mina!" he'd cry, "go! Get out of the cave! You can run—be safe."_

_"Burr, I'm not doing that! I'm not leaving you—" The glitzy mienfoo would be cut off and she would be crying too._

_They'd all be crying, just as I am._

_And he would whisper in his bouncy tone that doesn't deserve to be quiet, "I love you. I love you so, so, so much... and if there's any way I can keep you going on longer, I will. You know that, Mina—you're a beautiful girl and I'm not letting anything hurt you for as long as I can, but this is the moment we'll have to split." And the hand I hold on my head would reach out to her. "I love you."  
_

"_I—I love you too, Burr! Don't... don't...! I..." She'd lose her voice to the cries and they would hug and kiss and they would meld together again for that one last moment, the brown fur with her sunny yellow and magenta, then his dark eyes and her light pink would open, and they'll have to split._

It's obvious the timburr would hold onto her safety as long as he could; and he must have done that. I stand and turn around and leave Burr and his stiff fingers to be, as I back out of the cave, back into sunlight, and then I see the ground. The increasingly-bloodied footprints of Tim's churning the snow dark and leading into the cave.

Then they lead out and now they only stamp over one set: a small pair that must be for a girl pleaded to run, to live. She'd veered to the right and off, brushing over the edges of the snowy hillocks that I see now steadily release plumes of snow and have covered the rest of her tracks accordingly. Tim's sticky prints aren't so easily lost. He follows her, though by his fresher tracks I'd say he took his time... murdering his brother. Not truly brothers, but close enough that it matters.

And he's going to kill his sister now.  
He's gone off to murder her, too.

I'll find Mina; we can grieve as one; and I'll... I'll be... o-okay... I'll never hear Burr singing his wayward songs... or see that cocky grin with the gentle tease... or see himself wrapping his arms about the flowery mienfoo and hear him teasing her... nevermore.

Death—why must it happen—no—why must _Tim happen?—_and thus _kill? _He is murdering souls straight open. "Mi... Min..." I cough.

"Mina..." My voice has shrunk into its rasp. I stutter back and run on, the blood in the yellow blanket streaming now.

Maybe I'll clean it later.

Maybe I'll bury it with Burr's body—and then I recall. Elijah. _Elijah. Did they bury his corpse? _His... body... Burr and Mina would find it on the new Paradise, of what was once the Glacial Palace, and they would find the... frozen... body... Elijah's beautiful soul once took hold in. The tears run freely with me and cover the fuzzy fabric wrapped about me as well. I'm sticky and cold and wet and disgusting and I have to find Mina.

Mina.  
_Mina.  
MINA._

Stepping over patches of grass even as the snow, as the ice, and slipping and coming back up—_Nope nope I cover my face with the blanket and run and trip and fall and get back up and the cycle repeats until I can safely confirm that it'll be okay again. It's just... Tim's blood. _But now it's also... Burr. My stomach gives a sickening lurch and I cover a hill, skimming off to the left, straight across the tundra as I begin to travel upon the ice crackling up, up, into the night sky. Turning, I watch and see how the gentle clouds begin covering and refilling this land with snow.

I recall the map of Truught; none of this is on there. This, I conclude, must have become unbearably cold land that flooded over waters and eventually froze unto Truught. Vast; large; beautiful; deadly. So deadly; too deadly. I don't like it here. Burr died here.

Burr  
died.

Again I swallow and plow up the side of the icy rocks furthermore, cutting up through the frigidly thin landings until I come up to a clearing of ice, leveling with the higher ground. Surrounded by stuttering falls and higher cliffs, I suck in a breath and search for Tim's red footprints; I'd still lost Mina's. Sitting there, huddled in the blanket, shivering and crying and losing: losing it—my gaze turns and snaps.

There lies the abused back with a long, thickly corded scar reopened and spilling, still spilling. Faint gasps, faint breaths, and I run back and round and lie level next to the mienfoo, my head turned to I can see her. I take a magenta arm and wrap it over me.

"Lla...na..." Her whisper is throatier, sorer, losing life: worse than my rasp, much, much worse. A cough; she takes a moment. "Llana..." Her own tears beside mine. "You see... that I'm not going to last much... much long_—er_—?"

"Yes," I whisper, "I do. I'll stay with you... until it... a-ah..." I force my head down and the arm I'd draped on me tightens. "I can't take it..."

She whispers to me, "Me neither.

"Llana?" My head swivels to her pale yellow face, now smeared an unearthly orange from the dried blood. The purple dots lying gently above her teary, magenta eyes as well look dirtied and cold. "I was one of them. I was spawned as one of them in a Mystery Dungeon. I was one of those wandering fools. I had no mind, no anything—there was a girl with me, a lighter mienfoo, like how Tim is darker than Burr, I recall, and her name was... well... we didn't have names.

"But she called me Mina and I called her Fiona. And other than that, attacking those like you who really lived and... we'd mob, try to defeat them, you know."

My mind, so numb as it is, quietly accepts.

"And sometimes we would succeed. I recall some creatures that lost themselves to us... I...I don't know what happened to them, but that was my life for a time. I just had Fiona, and she just had me, and that was all we knew. Then... once... a group of gray-furred jolly fellows came sauntering in, all male, all powerful. One of them, he was a little more brown than the others, he took a glance at me and whistled. I didn't know what it meant but it was one of that boy's flirts, of course."

This is... this is when...

"Fiona glanced at me. She knew something was up. Then... when the timburrs and the gurdurr had collected the rocks in our cave Mystery Dungeon they were looking for, the brown one looked at me again, and I followed him. I'd never seen anyone like him, and I didn't attack because of his power. When... when I first exited that place I was meant to be as a mindless nothing... the magic sucked out of me and something in me pinched.

"And I _felt." _It socks me in the stomach. "And... I joined that crew, their Gurdurr Crew. I knew Gurdurr's name but when he changed it to the species I swore too, to never tell. Not unless he died... honorably. But it looks like I'll die before that happens... eh..."

Tears... they fall freely down our faces and meld together in one puddle below. "One time, much later, the pains in me were worsening I knew but I lived with them. Pretended they didn't exist. And then... we found a light pink and pale yellow-furred corpse, and it was Fiona. She'd gone looking for me." Mina's swallow—a hard-pressed gulp—pinches in me. "And her body was absolutely stuffed with rips and tears. I didn't know at the time, but they were all corded from her side, and they eventually consumed her.

"That was happening to me. I didn't know it yet, but that was happening to me. Because I didn't belong to life. I didn't deserve to live. My purpose was to repeatedly respawn and take down creatures in the same Mystery Dungeon mindlessly.

She sucks in a breath. "The first time Burr kissed me was when they started. And it... it was terrible... I remember I couldn't feel anything and it was killing me, taking me over, after all these beautiful, countless sunrises with these creatures, building so many homes and helping and working and the jolliness of it all... and I was dying. I was going to die. But he.. his... his sticking to me it... it somehow saved it. They remembered who I was so they didn't question it, connected the dots. That night I ran away. I felt terrible, disgusting, stupid—any of the personality I'd grown had ripped apart.

"At first... I lived in that hole again, the Mystery Dungeon. I don't know why. Fiona was dead. I didn't know anyone. It felt safe, I guess. But... I missed them. Burr and Tim and Gurdurr. And it hurt to be without them, more than when my scar came. I wanted to be who I'd learned I could be again." I watch her lips as she whispers, the stretch of her pale, sunny jaw, the clear, liquid stains leaking from her eyes like she was losing color, losing everything—and in a sense, she is. She'd dying, she's letting go of her story.

My heart throbs, bulges, pangs in the throng of these emotions bubbling up for her_—for her_. "So I asked around, learned about this snivy who'd apparently shined a light their team had lost a time after I disappeared—admittedly at first I was out of my mind scared Burr would end up falling for you"—my mind blanks at the thought—"and I found you... and I found them again..." Crystalline tears spin like thread and slip down into our puddle.

"The worst part was remembering how Burr said we should think about becoming mates soon... and I was so excited to the thought, but I wanted to wait, just a little longer.

"I shouldn't... have waited..."

The words sink and fill, overflow every space inside of me, from inside to out, sucking reason and belief and leaving me cold, and shivering, and in pain, in place, eyes washed out and the blanket losing warmth and dear Mina's fingers and her arm draped about me—losing warmth. _She's dying. _The words jar me open and the overflowing overflows over the ground, over the space we sit in together: _she's dying. _I swallow; I cry; I feel the words and the emotions flowing freely outside of me, and Mina's blood is drying and _she's dying, she's dying, she's dying. _

"Llana... when I die... can you put me... next... to him..?"

She's losing the battle. I feel it. Her breath wavers, nearly snaps, and I nod slowly, solemnly, feeling in my heart I will be the last pokemon to ever see Mina alive. "Thank... you... I love you—I love you guys. Llana... I'll... miss you, you... you know... Burr won't... admit it up in... in heaven... but he feels the same...

"Thank you for everything..."

They boil over: everything. I croak: "I don't want you to die... I didn't want either of you to die..."

"Sometimes..." She pauses, magenta, jewel-like orbs blinking in and out, in and out, slightly, painfully. "We don't get what we want. When it's our time..."

Will I ever have that—my time? Unless I somehow convince Tim to kill me too...  
this...  
This is the last time I'll ever be able to see the mienfoo again... and it cuts me... and it hurts me and...

"I love you too, Mina... I... I can't..."

"Oh, Llana... you're so adorable... heheh..." The body heat trembles from my side; it's giving out. I'm losing her; she's losing her battle; I knew this would happen, I knew it, she's told me so much and yet still it hurts, a cold stab of icy, icy pain from the ground below drilling deep into me.

She coughs, her own tears clogging up in her. "G-...good bye..." A little, beady little smile stretches across her lips. "Show Tim... how to feel... joy... again... for us..."

And it's the last thing I hear from her—the last thing I'll ever hear from her, and Mina's body gently falls beside me, and her warmth begins to deteriorate out from existence. Nothing left to do, I rest my tear stained face in her peachy yellow fur, just about the cords of scars in her back where and when she was meant to die but lived, and here she lies now, dead.

She's dead.  
He's dead.  
Mina's dead.  
Burr's dead.  
Tim killed them.

...Tim killed them.

I... will never see them again.

Ever. Ever again. Never never ever.

Burr's singing, his silly singsong voice, his flirts, his booms of joy and reunion and his smile... or Mina's glitzy turn and smirks, at first shy but soon bolstered again with renewal with who she is. They died. _They died._

Just like Elijah.

The knowledge weighs in me. But there's nothing more I can do, so I take Mina's cooling, dead body and I plow it and drag it—try to be nice—down the icy mountain and its resting area, where she hid and where she was struck. Snow billows and howls in front of me, sucking in my air and replacing it with the cold, numbing my face and tears, masking me with okay when it's not, not okay. No—they say everything will be okay, and I see now why Cheeka—why Zoey—why everyone—hesitates upon saying that. They'll be okay; I won't. Now I remember; now I see.

When I reunite their bodies as their souls must be up in the heavens, I quietly dig into the snow with frosty fingertips and I build up the snowy flowers I find, and I climb atop one of the brilliant white hillocks under the dazzling sky stuffed with clouds of snow and tears and pain and I craft the grave. And I pour in the bodies. And I lose the blanket, wrap them up in it. And I cry.

And I leave.

The trail, cold, numbing, unforgiving, still splotched with red ooze but hidden of the prints Burr and Mina had made, shows me pieces of Tim. I don't like Tim. He killed them. And now I'm sad. And now it hurts, hurts like nothing else. And I walk.

I walk without thinking. It's all I can do, robotic twitches in the muscles up down up down. Up—down—up—down—when does it end? When I arrive back at the Paradise, still cold but with taller floors and some roofs, and I find a new blanket, this one a gentle pink, like the marks on Burr's body or Mina's eyes. And I choose this one, this time, and I wrap it about me and with my blood frozen and tears frozen, nothing spills on it.

Wandering aimlessly, I stumble upon, just outside, a flower. And further along, there's a patch, weaved together, surviving as one in the cold Bittercold. Cold... cold Bittercold. A fresh dug-out bit of soil, disturbed and bumpy enough to catch my eye, lies in the middle.

Then I see what must be inside, and I collapse. I can't take it, I can't... I can't... dead dead dead—stop... stop dying... please stop falling out of my grasp, I want you, I need you... you're all dead... and I'm all alone, and it's cold, even with the pink blanket now...

My head touches his grave and I cry, and I cry.

I cry for a time. I don't know how long, but it's still night when I glance up. It felt longer. Or—maybe it's because I've frozen now.

Am I dying?

Then my eyes catch on the big, dark ones in front of me, met with a white face and the yellow flaps under snowy arms, and the black ears and black rimmed about his expression, a blush with a little grin. Why is he grinning if he's dead? Am I dead?—no, it's impossible, Tim hasn't touched me.

"Hello, Llana," whispers the cheeky tone, opened up to me now that he's known me, now that he's gone into Paradise, and I don't know why I see him but the tears come, and his embrace is warm.

**I am sad now. I just killed two characters.**

**Elijah: Well I'm not sad like heck no**

**Me: -sticks tongue out at him- Well no I'm... a little happy. I stopped crying. I'll probably cry more when I revise chapter though. Ugh. **

**Elijah: hah **

**Me: Pbbt. (yep, I did cry, you count on it, such overemotional starry) Fun fact, I've been planning both the deaths and Llana meeting ELIIJAAHHHHH? gasp—just at completely different times and plots. They're... really complicated. Heh. But each time, Burr tries to protect Mina, even until the end. x3**


	21. Postponed Warnings til Later Notice

Chapter 21: Postponed Warnings til Later Notice

In a rush of warmth and the cold and death and tears and sudden pangs of fur rubbed against my scales—wherever I had just been, it disperses, disappears from my sight, from placement, it's simply gone, and so am I. No more Tim; no more death; no more gelid conditions thawing me open. Elijah—Elijah—_Elijah _is holding onto me, and I know not how, or why, or when this transition occurred, but I must have lost consciousness at one point or another to be without snow and just feel—truly feel—the emolga.

"Am I dead?" I squeak.

He laughs softly, the warmth of his voice, of his cheeky self, infectious. "Nope, not quite. I am, but last I checked, you haven't quite gotten the slip." The big, dark orbs watch me curiously, comforting. "Thanks for staying alive for me. I can't do much, but I love being able to see how you've done."

And then I laugh, too, and sudden tears slip into my eyes from past trauma and now, and now with Elijah and his fuzzy, white fingers arisen to wipe at them. "I... it's... I can't explain..."

"Wow, you really are talking more," he quips with that lighthearted tone. Then, softer, "It's nice."

That silly, just slightly-twisted smile over his white-furred face warms me. I... I don't know what to say, what I should say; why is he here? Where am I—are we—even going? Is... is this possible? The warmth in my chest begs it not. "Elijah... I'm not... I'm not dreaming, am I?" Though I suppose if this isn't real he'd still assure me otherwi—

_Thip. _His hand, a slap to my face—light, cushioned, but feeling trills. "Yep. You're awake... you're awake with me, dear Llana." My face reddens; he chuckles again, but his tone's gone softer, kinder. "I... I never thought it would happen... but it did... and I know you're probably still trying to adjust, but I am kind of used to where I am, so I'm just really, really happy now. I prefer seeing that cute smile of yours up close than from where you lie. And... it breaks my heart when you cry."

"So... you do watch over me."

"Heh... of course I do! I really do love you, Llana, and I know I never said that and I just kissed you, and I'm sorry I had to die right then and it was all this disgusting rush—but I seriously do love you." This bubbling... warmth... inside of me... because of the emolga with his arms wrapped about me as mine him...

It's a random detail, but I love how our heights match. Makes me closer to him, and makes him less similar to Tim. "I... I love you too, Elijah... I just can't... I can't believe you're here now..."

One small thought asks if Mina or Burr would be joining us as well—but it doesn't matter. I have him. The yellow-cheeked boy with the mischievous grin that could truly suggest anything, with a multitude of effects likely to cross in moments of action... and of course I remember his and Bay's shells, when one first meets them, how offhand and sarcastic he looks.

Everyone has a heart on the inside, and I don't want to know where I'd be had I never found this creature's here. Throughout the clouds and sunny ideals stretching past, I rest my head beside his and simply agree with the moment, green-scaled fingers traced and wrapped about his body.

I don't know how any of this moment is possible—and with my lucid abilities via Stella I am again assured this is, is possible—but... it's him. I could close my eyes and imagine Paradise altogether again, the only difference that the emolga and I had run off somewhere by ourselves in the middle of the night: him being nocturnal. A scatter of times did he and I do so in the dark refuge of his preferred waking moments.

Then, head rested, I need to ask: "D...do you know how this is possible?"

"Heh..." I'm sure his eyes twinkle from the question. He most surely does contain its answer and might possibly not tell me. "That's for me to know and you to find out... don't worry, you'll see quite soon though. I just think it'd be weird for me to say myself." Yep: might possibly not tell me. Though it appears as of now... that he has reason—and reason will shine soon enough.

Honestly, I really am simply elated, overjoyed enough that somehow I've reconnected with my love, who is dead. That's... really all that matters to me right now.

Thoughts trickle in and out as they always do, the most prominent asking about Mina and Burr—but I can't feel as much of the cold, wet rain of true sorrow now that this warm, electric-typed love of mine is grasping onto me with my head against his and he's supposed to be dead and I'm supposed to be unable to see him again, but I am...

It's more than a little tricky to focus on the grays of this new rainbow. I worry that this—not dream, but, whatever it is—will cease too soon, and I forcefully remove that thought, quash it whole: do not fret, Elijah is here anyways. "Heh... you're silent like the old Llana now. What's going on in there? Trying to adjust? I wouldn't really know since I'm used to everything but the fact that my love is in my arms, so it's like..."

A drawn-out laugh soon drifts out from my heart. "I'm... happy... and confused... and afraid I'll lose it all soon."

"I think I wouldn't let that happen, ya know."

"Yes, well... er..." I don't know how else to put it. "You did die."

As I wasn't sure how he'd take it, the light tone surprises me just as much as any other response would: "Yep, I'm dead, but that just gives me right now as another chance to prove I'm gonna keep on protecting you anyways."

"I..." Again, lost. "Thank you..."

My soft, light auburn orbs flutter open and then I'm looking into his larger, darker seas of black, with an even blacker pupil, like an island, in the middle. I catch the sight of shimmers of light reflecting off of him, and the constant flicker of colors, and a certain brightness that must mean he's filled with joy. A near inconspicuous glow adverts him, just on the tips of his furred body. And a toothy grin pokes in; "Thank you too, Llana."

"Elijah..."

"I swear, I love you so much, wow. I've never felt so free with someone else!"

"Oh, I trust that's not just my, um, Sweethot... doing something to muss you up."

"Nah, I don't think it really effects me anymore anyways. It's... weird, I guess, being dead."

"Oh?"

"I guess you'll never get to experience it... but it's just... wweeeeiiiirrrrddd—you could say. Well, so... I... I don't really know. Of course your powers sort of got to me, but I don't think they changed me... But they might've grown on me a little. You know how our buddies call you adorable. Sort of like that, maybe. It's hard to explain... but I really feel at ease with you, anyway.

"Do you think your mutated stuff can, like, affect others?"

This pauses our persiflage as I sit quiet in Elijah's warmth for a moment, clouds continuing to swirl about us. The light shining from far above seems to give in closer—we'll surely reach the top soon. "It might... I know that Zoey's been much more cheerful, it seems. She sticks up for me; then there's you, and you and her are... very close to me. Stella, she's Stella; but perchance it... can affect you?"

"I guess so," he replies happily. "I guess that just might make me a little more like you. Well... I like it. I like it, either way. I might be saying I like nothing; but if it is something, I will take it kindly."

In response, I smile softly. This rush of warmth collects inside of me, as if the Sweethot takes this kindly as well, and this bundle of tepidness seems to push and bloom and grow. And such feeling, as it submerges, only rushes within and I feel that need to stay with the emolga beside me, whether or not he has what we guessed upon.

Does he, and perchance Lady Munaah or even that... that golurk I vaguely recall—perchance either of them or others that... I know not about... hold similar feelings tied to Tim..? Whether or not this is true, still my heart tears and I know he still wants me... in multiple ways.

I have Elijah, though; and he has me. I don't want to drop from him no matter what Tim chants for with that deep, inscrutable tone of his rumbling down from his throat and pulsating into mine, tangling like vines and seeding into me as if taking me over slowly. There will forever be that throbbing part of my throbbing heart within me, holding fast onto him.

And there must be another latched to the oshawott not currently with us, but forever orbiting in my head: Zoey, oh Zoey. He and she cannot be overtaken, especially by the burly, black threat looming overhead. If only he was a cloud, cumulonimbus like the others I'd seen, soon to blow off.

But Tim is not; he's a living, Bittercold creature, just like and just opposite of me.

And thus, the wispy marks of pale yellow clouds burst through, Elijah and myself floating swiftly—or is it him floating and myself only on for the ride?—towards the tops, if there is a tops and those aren't more clouds swarming above—because I can't tell any longer which is what. A peculiar white shape grows in sight and texture for the fluffy side as he and I land upon the puffy ground. And suddenly we're not floating but standing rather strongly on fluffy clouds. The white one in front of us speaks.

"So you have arrived." Not a cloud, it dawns on me: Stella. Her accent—a high-pitched her—of royalty runs thickly and plain to see, as if she's showing off her tone and not because she's born with it. "I knew you would eventually. I knew the emolga had... come... for you..." Her snout raises and the white fluffy one peers at me oddly with her bedazzling purple orbs, the necklace about her throat showing and sparkling the slightest. Perchance mine is, too.

Even as we've landed his white-as-Stella hand continues to trail by my side, draped about my scaled back. "Yes, we've arrived," he replies, dot of a black nose poking up and out like Stella's, "and I've got her. Care to explain where we are?"

A gleam enters those violet irises, slashing directly across the entire pupil. "Why, of course. She is my Llana; I suppose it's my job as well." A snide cut of a grin slices under one side of her uplifted muzzle. I can't tell if the emolga sees eye-to-eye with the white-furred immortal one just in front of him and trust, oh please, that they match enough. "See, Llana;

"We're in our own kingdom." _Like the Glacial Palace, _voice unmentioned words in my head. Already I have plunged into the deep end of what has happened. "While you're not completely, rationally... here... you quite plainly are. I certainly can tell you your body isn't where it was, and that you're legitimately standing on a cloud there with ol' Eli"—they must be seeing eye-to-eye; I breath a sigh—"but at the same time this place is weird and I hardly can tell what I've done. So... I think you are—well, you are—safe here.

"Actually, think what you want, I built this nice cloud area of chambers—you'll see more ahead—from the Sweethot energy already loitering here. Bittercold festers and wounds; yours is... quite harmless. And floats. Thus it's harder to get your Sweethot out and displayed; plus you don't have any twisted sort of desperation lurking in you, so that's always helpful. And... well, I of course had help, but more of that later.

"So... I suppose now I pause to receive and mull over questions." Like that, like one of the felines I know well, Stella lands hard on her rump and coils her great, fluffy tail over her paws and returns with a pesky grin.

For a moment I lose myself—what do I... say..? "Um..." My weaker accent gives me a childish outlook; I sidle up to the emolga beside me, feeling... safer, with him, and try again. "So basically I'm arriving my own little... palace, only it's to help others?"

"Well, technically you're helping out the dead up here, and you're with my fluffy ones—but same thing, yes."

"So... this is where all of my mutated specialty went? This is why the world is so out of balance, to say?"

"Also that and the fact that Tim festered sooner... and thus we have where we are today."

My painful pause. "And... um... how long do I get to be here—with—with Elijah like this?"

"Not... forever. This is unstable as the Glacial Palace is and eventually will do away. But I thought you needed this, if only for a suspended amount of time. But what is time, and what is change, and what are moments? Well—that is to say—enjoy your stay."

_Enjoy your stay. _It's like I'm visiting another world here, only... it's apparently mine, down to the blood racing in the depths of my flesh and bone. And I also have someone who's dead by my side. I realize then that I never thought of asking my dear fluffy one how he's come here; though I suppose all dead are... free to roam in this area. My company until I have to leave this safe haven will withhold betwixt either the dead or any of Stella's fluffy ones who apparently have come here now.

Then I recall: I will meet Herb here at some point. Her conversation comes back to me: _"And then you've told me so much about her friends like Bay and Burr and... um... you know, that guy who—""Awww... I'll have to meet up with you again, Llana, and learn about you more next time! It's a will-do, you'll see!" _That first one, prior, must have been Herb nearly spoiling the fact that she and Elijah are on swell terms, as now she must be here with the other fluffy ones; it roils in me as well, that I will see her and the chieftain, Stella's father, and... others, perchance. Others. The latter merely refers to that we will meet.

And we will soon.

That... that we will.

As of now, all of my needs lie in my hand, clasped with—clasped before—me, dark orbs bright in the shimmering effulgence of the floating clouds and wherever the castle may lay beyond, as I recall how the Glacial Palace had floated, and now the... the... Kindred Palace—yes, kindred—must fall, fall apart, eventually. It will send shades and rivets of golden kindred powers though, as how the Bittercold's taking over of the sky had gone until we collapsed it; I struggle to force those images of Kyurem, the ice dragon legend, and how he had been brainwashed into the darkness once.

And here we are now. I hover in that moment, betwixt taking into arms the golden, clouded home of mine as I hold Elijah's hand—the hand of my love, connected to me in more ways than one—and I watch the clouds as they swirl, and I feel the related love churning inside of me, linked between our entangled fingers.

I'm... okay. It's easy to see where I am now and push away everything else that's gone on.

I... I have Elijah with me now. It'll be... it'll be okay.

**Me: haha yep. It's a short chapter. ^^ I just want a nice introduction to Llana's sudden change in environment, let it sink in a little, adjust to it and all that jazz. So... yaaaay~ She'll be okay. For now. Let's see what happens when she has to go back hahaha... -cries for her-**

**Elijah: Just don't mention it.**

**Me: I think I won't yep. Fun fact... I've always had this sort of place planned, and this would be when Llana found Stella again, in here. She'd have the dreams and all that—but this is it. Also the old haven thing was... really messed up. And needed saving. And... noooes, I like where this is going more. Oh my gosh the old plans I had for this story were so messed up... xD**


	22. Breath Required to be Taken Away

Chapter 22: Breath Required to be Taken Away

Elijah's reflectively hued orbs hold fast to mine. "We're about to set foot into a castle made out of clouds," he says nonchalantly, then adds, "so if you're the queen, what does that make me? I'm not a squire—right? I think I wouldn't make a nice squire?" His islands of pupils glitter at the joking attitude.

"You can be... um..." The word hits a nice bludgeon, a hard _thwack, _in my chest: king. But that—I splutter internally, raking claws over my eyes in pathetic attempts to think. What would that make he? The words squiggle in me and I don't want to say it but I don't see what else he would be; and I rather can't figure where else I'd want him to go. Hanging my head almost as if in shame, I mumble, "King?"

"Wh-whoa, Llana, you didn't have to get yourself all worked up about it! I was just joking—sorry; sorry!"

"No, no, it's—"

"My, fault, I'm sorry." Our faces flush: his first, then mine.

"It's not," I squeak, "it's not your fault. I'm okay. I was just... it was weird. Wanting to label you as one thing and fearing you'd ask for another, and then somehow forming an answer in the end—I like it when you ask me those sorts of things that get me thinking. I mean, it hurts, a little, but... it's nice as well. And I'd rather it was you than anyone else." Yes; I'm most indubitably displaying reddened scales flecked all about my pale cheeks. But it's true, as well. It's... not so bad to be teased by him.

Those orbs flash. "Ohhhhhh my gosh, Vivi"—so he knows her name as well, a dark spot in my heart brightening rather fast—"was definitely right; you're too adorable at times. Thanks."

"Thanks?" I inquire.

"Yes, thanks. For being yourself. You make a swell Sweethot, and you're always enjoyable. It's nice to recall who exactly you're spending your time with." He doesn't have to voice it to say who he is: Elijah, it's you, Elijah, I'm spending my moments here with, however long or scattered they are.

In a sudden flick, Elijah's white fluffy cheeks dye themselves a fresher red as well. "U-uh... Llana?"

He's gone serious. It's a quick transition; my heart stops jumping for a tedious second. "Elijah?"

"We're about to go into a public space and all... and I dunno if I'll ever work up the courage t—can I kiss you?" He broke himself off, bumbling over useless speeches to delve right into his point. The emolga who should be dead but isn't, who I love so dearly, would like to have his lips on mine. If my heart had stopped prior, the pause is nothing compared to the new rush in my chest.

I can only gasp softly. "I..." How do... how—"Of course." There; that's how. In a quick motion, as if scared I'd change my mind, Elijah twirls instead of by my side to facing me straight with those large, black orbs painted with my light self fiercely stark in the midst of their gentle depths, his small, white fingers clenched over my spiraling shoulders and he hesitates for a moment.

That single moment allows my heart not only to flutter but sprout wings and fly up through me.

The hesitation seems about ready to fry me open this unbearable wait until suddenly there's a bright white movement and soft, gentle warmth creases over me, over my lips and with his and then we stand there, locked in the embrace.

It's as if time has stopped—or he's waiting to see when I'll push away..? But I... I want Elijah to see that I don't—not whatsoever—dream of pushing back and out from him, leaving the emolga stranded somewhere: without me. When all I want is to be with him, heart filled with love for him and himself pressed against me; I weave my own hands around his back and twist close to him, just... to feel him... to understand he's here...

And even though he's dead he's with me.

I've never kissed a soul prior to him, though Stella's given an odd, affectionate lick with her tongue on my cheek at times; and... I... it's so nice I don't know if I could stop, though eventually he does push me back the slightest, those deep, midnight orbs watching so kindly. "I could spend all day doing... that... but, uh... I think we've still got a few more complications..? Eh..." Expression tinged with pink, he extends a hand and I coil up to him anyway as he walks.

"Have you ever kissed someone before?" I mumble.

It's on my lips, still, the tinge of white fur against me, the softness... the gentleness displayed...

I don't like imagining that it must eventually stop—stop feeling this way.

"Well... yeah. There were pokemon where I used to live. I... I had a mom and a younger sister. They're... probably still alive now, I take it." He shows a sudden reflection of emotions: joy and... pain, an aching pain. "Well, there were other girls too. I've kissed a few, I suppose, but you really open me up. I've never... felt that way before. I bet even if I kissed Bay—well... you know." He shakes himself.

I giggle softly. "Yes, let us not kiss Bay soon."

"Agreed."

There, with the slight, giddy bounce on our toes with the other strung into the one's arm that our gazes flicker up as one and I see what Stella has created: for me, all... for me. The rainbow-strung windows with cords of light flickering, and the chamber to symmetrical chamber to the heart-shaped dome in the midst of the gently-sculpted masterpiece, each honey yellow cloud bright and smooth and surprisingly durable for its squishy soul. The entrance way, carved by clouds and lit with purple, small holes flickering with the violet light suggesting almost as if gems, beckon us open with a flip of a door.

Elijah blinks. "You get used to it."

"Really?"

"Actually, no. You don't. It's... amazing."

"Yes," I mumble, "yes. I feel a little guilty Stella crafted this all for me..."

One of those cheeky little grins fixates upon Elijah's white lips. "Don't be. You've been through a lot, you're doing a lot, and you could use a little rest. None of the others even knew what was going on in your head til you let it slip to Espa, who's spread it to the others. I'm pretty sure Zoey, of course, she... knew something, but the others must just be really surprised. I know I was, when I realized that Tim was out to get me."

"He's not someone you want against you," I muse softly. "I... I wish so terribly much he didn't murder you like so... but he did... and when I got to you I was too late, you were already losing too much blood, your fate had been sealed with those blackened claws and..."

A sniffle; my green-scaled fingertips go right up, try to block it, but those shimmering orbs see it. "Oh, Llana..." One of Elijah's own hands reaches up to lightly pat my head. "It wasn't your fault, you know. Or mine, really. It's just... he loves you, and you love me, and I love you, and... he doesn't like pokemon getting in the way between you and him."

"He doesn't," I mumble back through my hands. _He doesn't like pokemon getting in the way between you and him—_Tim has explained such to me prior. Is that... why he soon found himself with Mina's and Burr's blood on him? Did they get... in the way for him? Betwixt himself and myself?

Though now I can't tell; for all I know he's just killing whomever the chance applies to, long as it isn't me and I'm not there for it. Like a flash, I see why: if... I was round when the timburr took a life, supposedly I could try to kill myself by running into him in his art. Thus I would die; he doesn't want me to die. I can't pinpoint any of his tactics, but with satisfactory clarity I know he doesn't want to kill me.

And it's not because he'd die if I did. No; it goes deeper, deeper and too close to how I feel about Elijah and so, then toppling over the edge: too far. Too far. I swallow at the thought.

"Llana!" The dear, cheeky voice shatters through my thoughts. "C'mon; let's check out your new ordeal." Flashing one of those little grins back down upon me, as if he's become my sun, Elijah beckons me forward. A white paw extends, which I take, and we go up through the purple clouds sculpted into smoothly engraved doors. Stella—and the dead—and the other fluffy ones of her tribe—have spent such a drought of time here, all for me. And in the end, like rain, it's... paid off, filled them.

Although droughts are more of a storm prior to the rainbow, and by the smug grins on each passing fluffy one we soon cast eyes to, there wasn't a real storm in preparation of this castle. They seem content, which does apply a padded ease to me.

Elijah, hand never straying from mine, focuses his round, dark orbs on the warm colors of the chambers then on my own face, and perchance a smile and a move on. Exploring the numerous caverns, sticking our heads out of rainbow-sheen windows and feeling the mist fleck our cheeks like freckles—like Zoey's freckles, which give a quiver in my heart—and simply wandering, being, in the company of one another.

Eventually we grow taller in height from the ground, the castle blooming furthermore from inextinguishable size that twists in my eyes and seems to push the clouds from the further-up windows down to the earth so that they begin to form little toy shapes like oshawott or dunsparce or even victini, with the double pointed ears and cocky stance of folded arms. Seeing even a glimpse of F forces a giggle within.

"They look like them—no? You see them sometimes, the living, like little rainbow holograms just out of your reach, moving, doing, not even realizing. And we can watch them from on the ground—well, the bottom clouds. They're closer, easier to watch. Since, well, dead don't need sleep, I've spent this endless allot of time just watching over Paradise: over you. Though Bay's gotten a fair slice too. I even looked after my mom and sis as well. They're... doing well. I don't think they know I'm dead. If you ever see them... you think you could let them know..?" Elijah's voice has gone softer as he speaks.

"I'll... I'll let them see you as who you are. As... your own light, your own joy, surrounded by friends and love until you passed on to here. And you've become a wonderful pokemon."

A little wink of a smile turns back to me. "Was I wonderful before?"

"Um..." Like last time, I lean on the blunt side of things. "You were quiet and a little grumpy, but you still had your hidden heart of gold."

And this time it's his eye, with a gleam of a rainbow in its murky depth, that winks. "Sounds good enough to me."

"You sure?"

"Of course!" Affirmation obvious, a knot in my stomach I hadn't noticed seems to release. I suppose, on one intricate, hidden layer, I haven't seen the dear emolga for a time and sometimes I worry just on the cusp of thought and action: is this right? But I... don't; I don't have to fret like this. He... I know him, and he is kind and understanding toward me. One doesn't need to be so hesitant around the ones she loves.

His hand, warm in my own, warmer than the lukewarm breeze airily sifting in the cloud chambers, reminds me of just prior, I'd had ice at my throat and Mina's and Burr's gelid, frozen blood on my hands. And... now it's as if it all melted off with the snugness of where I've come to now.

No other direction to go, we continue scaling up, Elijah persistently repeating that there's something cool at the top I'd like; I believe him, yes, but why did Stella craft such a beautiful piece on the highest point of this castle? I don't admit that I'm not tired from this much movement, though by now my toes should have been slightly battered and bruised a rancid purple, as well as aching in place. But... none such admits to my scaled skin.

He doesn't say anything about it either, though I'd think the emolga might notice—though he has been dead. Do dead recall what happens to the living?—what_—truly—_is it like—to die? A sensation I'm blotted out of; the shimmering body of black on Elijah's back seems to beg to differ, that he is differ: he is dead, and those radiant shines, when they show every time or so, prove this.

Then the emolga's snow white hand splays out for me, fingers outstretched, and accept my addition to his warmth; if this chamber of the castle was the night sky, the hand I've just clasped would be my brightest star.

Up the cushioned stairs, scattered through halls, glimpsing out to windows sewn as one from those misty, bejeweled rainbows. There had been other passerby brushing by us as we went up, but that amount has skyrocketed downward to none else. I don't even have to pause for breaths; this... Kindred Palace is much opposite than its Glacial counterpart—though that is one of its main purposes. To differ from the gilded one of ice.

My friends, when we traversed that one, had to attack other pokemon, though there were a small stash of ice types finding home there, I vaguely recall—why, I don't know; because the palace offered them a... safety? Or perchance, as mine is, his was for the greed and darkness and—I recall, it wasn't Tim's palace, but Lady Munaah's of desperation.

There were chinks of Bittercold, like the ice itself, molded in, but most was build from Darkie's spirited means of pure, black consumption and La—the pastel-colored ghost, I struggle to replace—her desperation: pure, black: desperation.

If Tim had someone like I Stella... perchance he would build himself the... real... Glacial Palace? As far as I understand, he knows none.

"Llana..." A hand tugs mine; Elijah—yes. And immediately a smile blooms like a rainbow on my face. "We're here." So my eyes turn up as the last of those pesky though nonviolent steps are scaled, and I breathe clean, starlit air—quite unlike the cold, hard-to-catch breaths of the Glacial Palace.

It's ovular, and the vastness nearly takes both my breath and the room into great dimensions of size. One entire side is open and glowing with the tangled colors of rainbows, and it stops my heart to glimpse over for even a moment. The other, carvings of multiple creatures, all with quadrupedal figures and furry pelts but one—that green one must be what Stella did of me, either that or Herb isn't very talented at art, but I believe I see a larger, green, fluffy one with a pearl pink gem nearby. So yes; that is me.

A smile to my side. "Oh, you see yours? Yeah; Stella insisted you'd be in the middle, heh... I'm somewhere to the side." A white paw lifts, finger sticking out. I follow the arrow and sight a yellow figure with large ears and feet, that plume of a tail sticking out. "Mm? So?"

"Heh..." I beam back. "It's cute."

"Thaaaank you~" he responds, eyes that much brighter, even if the compliment was practically farmed. I think Elijah feels safer when he's assured he's done well, but perhaps only by those closer to him. Back when he still shelled himself from me, he didn't really go up to me or strike so much importance in my eye. Funny, how sometimes all it takes is to peek inside of that shell to catch a glimpse of the soul and feel desire to be with them.

Other times, the glimpse doesn't even need to happen; nothing does; it just does. Tim... apparently feels so... I shake myself; he's not here. Nothing, in fact, not even the darker-furred fluffy ones or deceased, have drawn themselves in any shade of gray or black. There are whites, hence Stella and also her violet aura, but nothing darker than such permeates the sunrise yellow clouds' composure.

"Ooh, here, I think you'll like this!"

No chance to respond; one of Elijah's hands rips at mine and we each turn, his other hand gliding across the back of my grass-colored head and quite easily ducking my pointed face into the window's frame and popping his own in after mine. "See..." The black ears whiz past my side, pulling to the right, and I look over horizons of clouds and puffs and other gently yellow substances. Rainbows, as well, jump from puff to puff.

So... colorful; and bright; and hopeful; and kind... Ember may even have smiled, did he come with m—

A bright red figure with the transparency of fog whooshes and beckons among the gentle yellows, a whorl of darker, curlier red draping over him. "Wow. Didn't think he'd be your first one you'd think of."

"A-ah... does it work for you too?"

With a _pouff, _the long-haired wave-blue primate one would expect appears out of thin air, her pale fingers clutching to his side as they move on... to wherever they're going, she just as nigh-invisible as he. "Yep."

I laugh softly. "I see." Then Ember and Cheeka are joined by an oshawott with her bright white head held high, still galumphing like her feet have grown far too large for her. A pink mouth stretches wide, but whatever cry she beholds isn't heard by our ears. I only... we only... see them.

"Yes. That was how I'd see you sometimes, if I didn't feel like coming down from here. It happened sometimes."

"Is that..." I pause; those dark orbs flicker over me, and my heart flutters. "Is that what... what position they're up to right at this moment? They're in direct movement?"

Elijah, face turned straight to me, nods and murmurs, "Yes, it is." His light, cheeky tone sobers somewhat to the touch. "I've... seen... a lot of things, that were hard to look at. But still I did, because it gave me access."

Further away, at a dizzying sprint, a black-furred creature dashes by below. The ones we'd summoned prior—Ember and Cheeka—vanish, and soon after does Zoey. Only the smoky-colored monster with the dark, heartless orbs and bloodied claws stays.

"You've... seen..."

Elijah pauses, as if afraid to tell me. His eyes, somewhat shaking, caress over the sight of me. "You won't take off, right?"

How do I show... "I've seen..." My throat tightens. "...many things, as well. I have no reason to leave you, nor any to want to. I want to stay with you. You can always tell me, I promise. I'm... who I am. And nothing will change that."

A breath; a sigh; relief. "I... I've seen Tim lurking—especially about you. If I summoned you, then him, he nigh always was around you, and let's be honest, I'm not only jealous of the guy but he... seriously creeps me out. I want to protect you and while I'm dead I can't, and it eats at me."

My head bobbles slightly closer to his. "Right... right now, I'm safe."

"I want you always safe!" he cries, then drops to a whisper, "I want you... always safe..."

For the first moment, I open my mouth, try to say something; it all crumbles away. My heart throbs inside of me, crushing painfully against my chest as if banging, begging, to be released, to connect with Elijah's had it done prior.

My eyes, pointed inadvertently at his lips, in feeble attempts to disguise it, now see why he'd asked prior to doing the action himself.

So, if he'd asked, and seems to accept and want it, and I'd already told him how much I want it... do I just—do I just go for it? Do I just...move... closer?_—and—_lean in_—and—_press mine—against his? Is that—all? It's.. not much, but the pain in my heart, bounding full-force against me, either suggests it will be a harrowing, dangerous journey, or to just go for it already you idiot Sweethot, and I can't tell if either of those guesses are even close to what my heart really tells me.

It's... strange.  
Creatures find it hard to display love, but easy to crush hate in another one's face.  
So then I...  
I should just...  
_take  
the  
plunge._

Breath forgotten, I do. Whence he figures what I've done, he does as well. Our heads, connected just outside of the rainbow-drizzling mist, our bodies suddenly, blindly reaching and finding our hands... I feel, with a swish and warmth, his plume of black fur and tail and my leafy, scaled one have collided as well.

I'm—with—Elijah.

My stomach loosens, warms.

And it's nice, so nice, to find love and give it back in this form of... a... of a circle as one. Just one.

Us.

We stand and feel and—kiss—like this, the time muddling in my head to some allot that matters not but just here, just with him, just feeling, being able... to have him... and him have me...

Elijah wants me safe. In the world we live in, safety isn't a forever; but it is now. It is... for now. With him. Dead or alive, with him, and with Stella and other fluffy ones and joy blooming like flowers and happiness a swarm like the endless yellow clouds outdoors of this cloud kingdom, cloud castle, and if only I could scrabble for explanations of joy or hope or safety but I can't, even if I feel that kind, gentle warmth building betwixt us.

"Arf! What do we have here!"

_Arf—_? What is this—arf?

"I speak, and I see! Oh, aye, tis be Llana and Elijah! How cute; how fitting—now come along children we have a story to tell."

I'd recognize that gilded, royal accent coupled with the tough, gruff fierceness, given time. But the alluring, regal, kingly feel bustling through the room: that is Stella's father.

That is the chieftai—

"Yeeessss, Llana. I am Chieftain, thank'oo. Now let us be off."

**xD OH MY GOSH STELL'S DADDY IS COOL.**

**Stella: ughstopembarrassingmeeeeEEEEEEeeeee**

**Chieftain: Why, I'd say I did a stellar job.**

**Stella: FATHER**

**Chieftain: SO STELLAR IN FACT THAT I'D HAVE TO CALL IT QUITE THE STELLATA PATTERN IT'S AS IF THE STARS ARE SCREAMING HOW ASTRONIMICALLY STELLAR THIS IS**

**Stella: DAAAAAAAADDDDYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY**

**Chieftain: ...HAH. **

**Me: -eyes shiny- Best dad ever. I first created him as stubborn and cold and all GRR FATHER GUY, but I like this way more. XD He's... a lot like his daughter, when you think of it.**

**Stella: ewe mooo—**

**Chieftain: MOOOOOOOO, DAUGHTER**

**Stella: FATHER WHY**

**(Oh geez guys I am so sorry this took a whopping week to come through. I took off on a vacation and didn't get to upload this, though I'd finished. But yay, I'm back and THIS STORY IS ALMOST DONE WHOA. Anyway, I'll be back to crazy fast schedule until this story ends. ^^)**


	23. Travel through Time to the Beginning

Chapter 23: Travel through Time to the Beginning

Those simple, hard-pressed, well-drawn words easily scrape us off the edges of the rainbow windows and plunge Elijah's—really our—heads out from where they were and what act they were committing to. My lips, still touched warmly, see how I already miss him pressed up against me. It... it is nice.

It is nice.

His hand still drapes over to mine, and he squeezes, and he's still there. He doesn't tread into fog, into the clouds, and leave me. Elijah's... here...

Elijah...

"Aye, lassie!" goes the broad though royal tone, stretching out and filling the chambers with ease. The fluffy one in front of me—long, thick, white furs and the occasional swift of a soft, tiny droplet of red—peers the most peculiar look, and those dark, warm red orbs seem to harrow down on me. His bulk—his self—do tower some. Just to a degree.

He continues; "How nice it is to catch a glimpse of you now, mate!"

"You... you mean me."

"Yes, dearie. Aye mean you." A toothy grin pokes from the white-to-cream-to-red strips of fur dangling about him, even to his lips with those white to red edges poking through. The dark, molten orbs peer at me breezily. The heat practically radiates from him; his powers and Stella's do not quite match up. Each fluffy one... is noticeably differentiating, even from those in relation to blood—if their relation is driven by blood.

Yellow eyes poke into the scene beside the hulking length of the father: of... of... "Chieftain." Chieftain, then; yellow eyes poke into the scene besides the hulking length of Stella's father: of Chieftain. Supposedly, then, that must be his name, the one above his daughter. A musty brown snout and even a slight snagged and waggling tooth, longer and sharper and altogether more worrisome than the ones not showing, and a gem the color of sulfur and the shape of a lightning bolt meanders.

He approaches us from a side of Chieftain; oddly, his lean, smaller, browner pelt feels at ease next to his fluffy ones' royal blood. "Aye, yes, this be... would ye like to introduce yeself, There?"

Immediately a scowl dribbles like spit down his face. "Whaddaya think, Chief?" He speaks in an accent similar to the red-marked furry one beside him, though without royalty and just a deep, dark gruffness. His eyes quickly alight and his broomstick tail puffs, and he corrects himself: "Oh, but that's all fine and dandy. I'm... There. It's my name. I teleport. All that cool crap." His head bobbles.

"You're..." Gazes strike like arrows for me; I swallow the motions. "...very accustomed to your leader."

"Aye," his chortle breaks loose, "of course I am! I practically grew as ol' Stell's brother at times! Plus we all are quite close as it is, this only ensures tightness. You feel it, aye? You feel it sometimes, brushing up against you. And... besides... for that tale her father and I must release... I searched for her just as much as he did." Those luminous, yellow orbs pale and shimmer like windows. Inside, there are dots of white that twirl like Stella's fur.

My own eyes flip over, burn into the clouds underneath. Their plush touch sinks into me and the pale bits of scale below my feet. I shift slightly; so does the cotton-like cloud. I'm... safe here. Of course I am.

Elijah's other hand tugs—clings closely, surely—to my yellow-strung shoulder as his lips press to the side of my face, to my ear slit: "Do you recognize how similar they all sound?" His own cheeky but cheery tone sticks out like a sore toe. I do enjoy his voice, but it's obvious how he sounds, and how different it is.

Even I... fit in. Would Chieftain be a sort of—of father to me as well, or an uncle, like Gerald was prior to his leaving me for death? "Lassie, your heat waves are mine to feel and decipher every single thought running through your mind right now. Call me as you'd like—Stella is attached to you like her lazy eye."

"Sh-she has a lazy eye?" I squeak.

There blinks his yellow orbs. "Sort of. Not really."

Chieftain smirks beside his... friend—son? Is it son? What do these creatures refer to as one another? My brain tumbles into an edge and splatters somewhere inside of me from the commotion. "No more than ye do, laddie. But yer eye's got some sorta problem with it—lookit it spin! Woo-hoo!"

"Oh shut up Chief."

"Haha, that got some action outta ya! Oi, and Llana, doll, he's... special, ye could state, to our Stell." At first, I can't help but peer through cracks of auburn slits back toward There's snout and trust one of his eyes hasn't popped out of his skull or grown a spin of its own.

Thankfully, the fluffy ones tease. Painfully overdose. Neither eye skitters; each sit level and yellow: suns embedded within his soul.

"Aye, Llana, why do ye and yer little boyfriend keep trippin' over similar thoughts? It's quite weird."

Our gazes trace over the other from his suggestion—alert—warning—whichever—but don't quite connect, don't quite touch. Elijah's breath falls just over my cheek, arcing down and looping under a shoulder. Mine must be just as melodramatic and filled with a tizzy of spirals cascading about him as well. The bubbles of clouds behind him still situate in their corner of rainbows-meshing-to-portraits-of-creatures-on-puffs, melding over ovular sides and folding rather neatly into one single circle.

And that's all it is: one. I stare numbly at it.

"Oh, uh, chief guy? There? Why are you suddenly being so formal, exactly?" Elijah's spoken thoughts ring bells inside of my somewhat-stumped mind, rig movements that set it off again. I had pondered such as well. Why, simply—_why? _What reason?—is there reason? I... I trust there is.

At the moment, I still struggle to adjust to this new assortment of knowledge, of Chieftain, the leader, and... this brown-furred pirate-like awkward-toothed There: whomever—wherever—he is. Reason demands order, bongs in me vainly.

"Why, it's actually quite obvious, our dead little Elijah," murmurs Chieftain. Why the molten-eyed one has skipped octaves to such a calm, soothing tone—why? The word reverberates.

Why.

One of those toothy grins charms There's lofty, loose expression, though it's Chieftain that uses his royal-and-high but gruff-and-tough tone. "Because Llana is in kahoots with our Stella, and therefore she should be allowed to hear our tale and attempt to make sense of it. She is... bestowed with our lives. Perchance it will assist her in learning more about her dear fluffy one as is ours; perchance our trust shall be built. I dunno—we just feel the need to let this information be released unto her bestowed entity."

"So you, like, need to tell Llana about Stella's family history."

"Yeah pretty much," intervenes There. His orbs glitter in amusement. "Told ya you didn't need to bore them with all of those words."

Stella's father snorts back. "Yes, perhaps, but I feel that more words makes me sound more..." His next word breathes out in style. "_Elegant." _

"Why do I bother," moans the brown-furred fluffy one back. The lightning bolt—signifying his telepathy, used with similar sorts of energy?—about his not-so-fluffy neck easily pinpricks light and attention as his head waves side to side: no, why do I bother.

A charming lad, he is. "Charming indeed."

"Shut up Chief this is embarrassing now I know how Stella feels for her entire life."

"If ye ever want to take my daughter's paw in marriage, good luck with that trashy tone of yours."

"I want to rip your head off, sire." There's words fret me—though I recall that the fluffy ones are immortal and this would be the... equivalent... of punching a friend on the shoulder. Though recovering from losing one's head requires more... regeneration?—would it be?

And what does the Chieftain do in response but beam brightly. "Aye, it's gonna take ye another large star's life span yet."

These immortals find jokes in most everything they speak of, which heavily berates from Stella's usually-formal appearance. Though... as I delve further into it, she more so placed the serious tone upon her as disaster struck, in attempts to calm others and lead and form a righteous path—when it had only been Gerald and Stella and myself, she constantly railed at the elder snivy, and aplenty a scowl settled upon his scaled face.

They teased often. The white-as-cirrus fluffy one of mine first forced it upon my uncle, but that shifty duet later settled. She may have teased me as well, for all I can recall; those times were... much longer ago. I didn't understand any piece of what—who?—I've become: who I am on the inside. This... mutation creature with a heart beating down her throat, thus living, but the heart of the opposite just able to slit me and kill me.

I shudder back from any unintentional thoughts on Tim; in places he's as unwanted as I dislike him, these times couldn't come more plentiful: remove him from any pocket of my mind. Remove him.

"Llana, ye havin' a hissy-fit or summat in yer head there? Ye not suffering, are you? Ye be safe here!"

Thoughts of my last incursion bubble off. "I... I am. Sorry. I'll be okay; just fine; just... struggling somewhat. It's very nice here." My own whisper of royalty in me palls in comparison to the great leader of Stella's kind. That is to be expected; what I must be sharing words so easily betwixt—all of these immortal beings, surely—are practically Arceus, each and every last soul.

"Aye, don't compare us to that silly bloke! He's the one that bet you'd be killed by Tim by now! Ohp—that word wasn't used. Nope. Ye heard nothing."

"Um, okay," is all I mumble.

"So..." There searches around our gathered group in the darkened, ovular chamber. "We're all gathered 'ere, it seems. Should we... like... settle comfortably—ensconce and all that good stuff—and tell the tale? Llana seems pretty trustworthy; she should be welcomed into our creepy little family by now."

Chieftain snorts again; his molten orbs slowly crawl, traversing about the top floor of the palace his daughter crafted. "Ye just indirect-ally insulted me, aye?"

There blinks; he doesn't confirm or refute his leader's question—did Vivi demand something like that from me, I'd spill rather quickly. She'd knock me over and fish out the news easily. Not quite the same with these... odd... fluffy creatures. "Should we sit down and start talking or what?" His accent deeply cuts into the room, and Chieftain, with another snort, falls his rump beneath him and yawns rather dramatically. The lean, brown one beside him follows in suit, without such a tired wave.

Elijah and I share a glance; I shrug awkwardly; he offers a slight smile: we sit.

My heart settling inside of me, I try to figure what I should feel over this odd little situation: should I be afraid for what Stella's past must have been like?—or pleased the fluffy ones even care this much for me?—or should I just shut up and smile when looked at and pretend this is all very helpful?

No, no—it is helpful. I want to truly understand who my fluffy one is: they're offering; I'm taking. So my auburn orbs stretch up and out and watch gratefully. Story time... I'll be listening for stories about Stella.

"Well, I'm sure ye've figured already we all are immortal and sort of impossible, when ye put yer mind tae it. But we're not. Not impossible: possible, yes." Snickering, There mumbles something incoherent to his chieftain who cuffs his ear sharply with the twitch of a lava-like paw. "Shut up.

"Ignoring that ungrateful brute..." Those deep, warm, red eyes embedded within Chieftain's thick head glaze softly in reminisce. "Twas me and one or another or so of creatures. We were the first of our kind. Back when time began. Crafted from... stars—the sky—celestial imprints—nature's elbow grease and spit: few multifarious of junk if you go asking about. Anyway... others came after the couple of us.

"Middenin, she was... twas the greatest moment I'd ever met. She was one of us, as well. I... miss her—er, anyway, she assisted in the finding of other fluffy ones all across the star-spangled galaxies. She'd be this lone figure in the sky; this lone creature hovering over a moon; this beautiful, lone, purple-furred, wondrous lady who had a heckofalot more strength and seriousness than oi did, lassie and Elijah. She was... perfect.

"And one time... she didn't come back.

"Stella did. And we knew... wherever she was, we'd never see her again. Lassie... do ye know what it feels like to love another? It's... the most greatest and strangest creation of all. Losing her: I may have cut off a half of me, because that was as well her. Half of me... is gone with Middenin. But I had Stella, my sweet daughter. I had enough brains to figure out who she was and why she looked and squeaked like me.

"She was... so... tiny. And adorable. Like a little baby cloud, only with the purple in her eyes, the purple crescent gem. Kind of like that weirdo gem thing ya got hangin' around on you, yae see?" My cheeks grow hot as a finger plucks the object under inspection. "Yep. That." And Chieftain's strong, royal, and now... humble, sanded-down, weathered, tired tone drifts through: a river of a tone washing us away.

His eyes grow darker, sweeter: maple syrup just ready to drip from him, so sticky and succulent and bittersweet: tears and memories clogged into one. "For ye squirts, time is quite short. For us... your puny lives be practical walking distance from one star to another: unreasonably tiny. A joke ye'd prolly misunderstand.

"She was a pup then. She and There. Twas adorable. Tis adorable. _Tis..._" The corners of sap-like tears eke with slugmaish pain, slurred and silent.

A secret glance—a baton—passes from the weeping leader to the smaller, leaner broomstick male beside him. His own figure lies haphazard, suggesting an uncaring notion, but the luminous, glassy yellow orbs struggle to eke nothing and contain a cool composure. "Yes... she was my best friend. And when Herb came along, she was with us as well. Stella, Herb, me. Ye know Herb?" I nod slowly so my head doesn't bobble and disturb what must be lying on the inside.

I feel nothing, but the lukewarm numbness suggests my cracks have begun to show through. The emotions race to catch the ride. "Yes, good. She and Herb and I. Then she and I became... a something more than best friends. She meant—means—will always be—the universe to me. More than your puny planets—more than a miniscule galaxy—more than the great, vast openness of space, of the universe in its own. She is everything and everything more to me. She is forever mine. And we don't die.

His own way of telling me his love runs broad. "But I... had an elder brother. He had... different insights than me. Our eyes would cross-fire and we'd set off. He didn't like me; I didn't like him. We each have our own little bits of evidence." The lines like webs tracing his back and limbs all lanced down to his paws that I see as his broomstick brown fur spikes: scars.

"Gravity... twas no word I could use to fill the hole of dislike I have for him. That, though, may wear away some time off in the near future. Ye'd be dead by then—well, yer normal-life-spanned friends to the least, but that's short for us.

"Gravity... tis bad. Tis always bad. He always looked off at Stella with a sort of breezy stare, hiding stuff behind his crappy cloud eyes. And... eventually he did something you don't want to happen to her. And by the time we'd figured out and started combing over for order, she be long gone."

Tim: it again bludgeons into me. A strong throng into my heart, reverberating and recklessly skating, spiking, reminding me. _Filthy scum. _She didn't just mean him; she saw Tim's first intentions. She... always did. She... wanted to, needed to, protect me from a similar fate.

Is this why she... lost her life to regenerate in the skies once more—lost herself to me? To try and... catch me... somehow. Save me. My throat tightens, and if I wasn't cracked prior, they come now.

What—Gravity—this creature—did—I understand. And he... Stella...

My breath spirals out of orbit, out of these cloud chambers. Gone. Lost. I don't look back to it.

What he did.  
What he did.  
No.

"Yes. The emotions toil in me now, as well. I feel you, little Llana." There has begun to speak again, his tone once laced with little spikes of energy and a pirate-esque venture now obviously sucked out to a melancholic wasteland. My heart throbs in my heart—in my head—in my stomach—down to my toes. "And... I was angry. At the world. At the galaxies. At the universe, because mine had been poisoned. My brother... aye, we never found him.

"We never found Stella, either. Not until she showed and do you know... how it feels... to..." He loses his momentum and he stops. I slump; an entity fluffy and warm takes my one side, another, as if I'd turned, on the other. One hugs me close, the other I sink into.

There is nothing for me to say.

The royal accent starts up like a shooting star to guide us out of this hole. "What Gravity had done... We're mixed with bits of a multifarious collection, yes. We're all somewhat like family; but love is rare. We don't... connect in such form. It's not exactly meant to be, not that it's... bad. We last forever; our love is like family, not supposedly like... So when it does happen...

He shakes himself, drops the fancy words. "Intergalactic messes collide. That blue-furred mongrel is a disgraceful, bumbling butthead. The end to his miserable self. Cap it off. Gravity's a special idiot case where something went wrong and he's not that likable, especially now. Now that he's gone.

A sneeze. "Good riddance." A sigh, softer, sadder. "Powerful bits of orbit mixed there. Each was... supposed to bond and have a share in the power which of course didn't happen because Gravity is a big dead butthead. Lots of explosions. Bad things. Mutations on different words—Bittercold? Sweethot?

"Thank us for the strangeness. It's connected to us... somehow. Everything is..." Softer, "Aye..."

I've fallen into a mangled topple on There. He doesn't seem to mind. These creatures can be welcoming. Welcoming enough.

His voice, coarse with emotion, slithers to me in bits and pieces from under woven strips of the dirt-brown and welcoming furs. "Then you find out Stella's not woven out of existence, and she randomly shows up again and spews about mutations and she's okay... and it's like happiness just socked you in the gut. It hurts, but mostly you find joy again and you can't believe it. Can't believe it was possible to find again, even if you're immortal.

"Time doesn't exist. Seriously. Just ask E-Bone when you've got the time—hah... that was almost a joke." A sad laugh. "It felt like... everything was stopping... when she was gone. Perchance she only dispersed for some time to be with you from your own growth to the age you are now, but with your own mutations like I know how long it actually was.

"It felt like I was dying on the inside. I never want that again. I—can—not—lose—her—again. It hurts, lassie. It hurts." With each word comes breath, soft and cool as a breath of air in the cusp of night, that strokes me. I decide that I should not take There's word lightly.

His voice, broken as whiplash, spiraling like its own stars, hard-pressed for collection and regeneration, refusal, rebuttal, nothing: it hurts. _It—hurts._

Attempting to muster cheer comes the stronger, royal tone further off. "Well that's basically our tale. We're all crazy but Gravity was crazier now he's dead and Herb is important. Other miniscule details. That sums it up well, if you ask me."

"Well enough to me"—There's glimmering orbs latch onto mine—"now how about we leave that behind now? We've covered what was needed, your tiny reptilian brain requires to divulge this abundance of information, and we still have yet to catch up with Stella or Herb themselves."

The others shift to rise. Elijah, beside me, brushes himself off as well; he refused from speaking to allow the words to flow... to allow them to seep directly in. Cuts: the words, sharp edges, flung from side to side, cutting into me. Stella Gravity bad friends Herb me aye HerbGravityStellamefriendsayebad.

A mesh of vocals crams down my throat and swarms like a wave to my ears. Steam rushes within, streams of whispers and cries burbling within me, colliding into creations rather left in the dark, not to find the light of day, and it takes bright white stars of hands to force me with a jolting tug to the ground. I slump into him, force myself up on my own, bend, sway, stand: stand. Clouds propel me onward.

There blinks his clear, yellow orbs—such a different mix than the color of the clouds he paces upon—and turns his look to me. "You took a hit, of course. It's a lot to divulge. I told ye."

"A-ah... yes, I know..." I mumble. A rasp stretches thin below, threatening to crack my speech in half. I teeter across the bridge; not a gap shows. "Stella means a lot to me. I wouldn't lose her no matter what you told me."

"Good girl," he responds. The brown-furred soul with the burning heart coats his tongue in such cool yet rumpled words. It's as if half of his voice overlaps with Chieftain's. He must have draped around the white-to-cream-to-red one, as he did Stella, surely in avoidance of his brother as well. And so... he speaks like them, acts like them.

Loves Stella—loves her. I love her as well, though in quite a diverse fashion.

_Good girl. _The words rattle in me like rocks.

"I know you must be tired and sore, all of that great mess-up, but I personally want to go and search out for Stella and Herb; they're quite close to me. And... Chief, course, wants to check in on his daughter and ourselves. I'd figure you'd want to run alongside us. You seem well. I don't mind you." There, as he speaks, sends other rocks rattling into me. They shake as one and hold as weight. I won't forget his odd lower tone soon.

And the words he sharpens and tosses at me like a barbaric pirate in its own—though with a cushioned sense, an I-don't-mean-to-hurt-you—won't be forgotten as well. In simpler status, yes, but not lost.

There is an intriguing bloke who has piqued my noticing. I wouldn't mind him, though even if I did dislike the brown-furred boy I would still rub by him repeatedly as he's known Stella longer and we each love her: how relieving my status is.

I only don't... don't like Tim.

Elijah, to my side, holds an arm safely strung into mine. White looped about green. I smile at the sight of us. "I already showed you around. You seem tied with these blokes. I'll follow you wherever you go, of course—do you wanna see what they've got?"

"They seem..." I stop for a moment, surrounded by new and old emotions alike, some shimmering and beckoning my attention, others old, dusty, dirty, untouched until my fingerprints descend. I float up in place, suspended to see what's gone on within me: all I know, chips and pieces and dissolving particles of Stella's father and Stella's—lover. Stella's lover. I even pour those stabbing parts in. "Nice."

He blinks. "Nice? Mm... they don't look bad, I suppose. Not your average killer. Not your... er, you know who. You wanna hang around them?"

I blink back. "I like them."

"Cool with me." His head bobbles in a nod, the black ears and ringlets about his figure. His puff of a tail flickers a smidgen. And he repeats: "Cool with me."

And he smiles back at me.

The other fluffy ones, one pair of molten red eyes and the other yellow glass, turn their broader heads to ours and shift their furry, excessively furry quadrupedal bodies over to the steps at the edge of the cloud-worn chamber, the yellows of the skies, of the looping cumulonimbus and warmth and sunshine and rainbows. They duck down. Fluffy bodies disperse; we do after. Clambering down endless lines of stairs and rows and corridors and chambers, I feel nigh... at home.

As if a Mystery Dungeon is at work, and every corner could reveal a Zoey stumbled over the edge, mumbling over how tired she is. Or a cheery Bay ready to kick our problems away. Or... Bu—Vivi. Her wise, purple-eyed grin and her joining of us, her joys as well mixed into ours. And others... other names, tacked with grins, eyes, faces, personalities, and misses. Misses that may never be fulfilled again.

Heart weighted as it is, I fitfully skirt certain names.

It works for now: a weak bandage. It works for now.

Our party soon swamps and meshes and welcomes the mint-green and cloud-white fluffy ones further down chatting heartily. The group required has been filled, and merry smiles spread and colors unite and I lock eyes with my—my fluffy one, and a swanky grin fills the space on her muzzle for me. For me. And I grin back.

Though There, yellow orbs glassy and finally broken over, pertains the swankiest smile I have ever seen with my auburn orbs. His paw purposely treads upon white, brown tucked over hers, an affirmation that _I'm here—_he's here.

We're... all here.

I enjoy these chambers Stella crafted herself, with myself and There's self, Herb's self... Elijah settled beside me, the Chieftain—Chieftain—protectively hugging toward the back.

These creatures... they _are _nice. I like them, and they like me, and we bode well together.

**PHEW GOT IT DONE THERE WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY**

**There: I'M FINALLY IN THE STORY OH MY GOSH. TIS BE GREAT. I'VE ONLY BEEN SLIGHTLY MENTIONED BY STELL—FIIIINAALLY.**

**Stella: -blushes like idiot-  
**

**Me: yes**

**There: -sees this- yeeess**

**Stella: nooooooooooo -angrily stumbles back-**


	24. Stellar Reminiscing

Chapter 24: Stellar Reminiscing

_Stella_

When she'd finally scraped that filthy rock and let her throat bleed and thus send her back to regeneration, back reaching for those stars she so desperately yearned to avoid, to block off, to just pretend they didn't, couldn't, would never exist again; then she fell into the methodical order of rumbles and whirrs and... rolls. Her own celestial body, shimmering with the power vested inside, crafted into the breezy, stellar appearance of the fluffy one she was, welded and weaved and fell apart. Simply broke.

Stella was broken. She didn't like the roll of those words on her malformed and partly-raw tongue but she couldn't argue. She was—simply—_was. _And there was nothing she could do about it as she recovered and trusted in the depths of her heart that not a soul would sight her.

A filthy lie, when one's father can detect heat waves and delve so far into another creature's mind just because of said heat waves. It was embarrassing, in the least. Her powers orbited about mind-speak, especially through the subconscious state of dreaming. While her blasts of purple—aura from her own thoughts—could burst and demolish, truly, her greatest feat was that dreaming. She could force other creatures to sleep, control wisps of characters—though that one was a little bland and bored her; she'd rather see the actual Llana—but nothing so noble as her so dear father.

Chieftain—now, he had those heat waves. And he could form and summon fire energy. And suck out the life of an organism just by taking its body heat. And all of this other load of crap everyone thought was so cool. They all were so cool; the fluffy ones should just take a vacation to Paradise and realize how much—all—of them would be gawked at. Stella already knew. Llana'd never really stared much: wasn't in her personality traits, plus she'd known this white-furred brute for a high and mighty expanse of her life: not such a lone figure in the past. Mostly scrawled on every memory like a fat, white stain.

She snorted.

Of course. She's a fat, white stain.

Another snort; a shot of laughter.

Llana would digress.

The regeneration pulled and scored at her white body for entities too long and breathlessly too short. It also didn't help that she planned to smuggle herself past her father every chance she could snatch. Which... technically would never work stating the fact that he was all-seeing and sensed heat waves of all things there are in the world to sense so thus she was already lopped off of a head but that didn't matter. Just try anyway.

Chieftain'd always thought that part of her was funny: the one that continued as planned even though she was destined to screw herself over anyway. Thoughts on that area tended to orbit strikingly fast toward a certain blue-furred mongrel the size of a gurdurr she'd rather not quarrel with, keep those untidy lot of memories untouched, shoved into the back of her head so she may as well pluck a shard of peace. Therefore, she took a mental step back and didn't glance toward Gravity's loaf of a head.

Ugly brute butthead.

Okay—then she stepped back. Calmer, slightly more cleansed—as cleansed as she could get after that... incursion—her lilac orbs shuttered and Stella had refused to use her mind for any more ideals, as empty and airy as it would go, which was far more cleansed than her restored body, since it wasn't getting any better either way.

Then she floated in place, paced, waited. Patience didn't deter straight from her, but she wouldn't go howling about how bored she felt, all alone and drenched in her own regeneration crap. Stars, dusty bits of nebulae, circular stones the color of There's eyes, the stuff that made her up and held her as one Stella and proved her immortality in the first place: restoration. Twasn't the first time Stella had lost her body—died, as one of those blokes from Paradise would have said it. She knew the drill: it stretched time in one's mind but only took the equivalent of one sunrise from Cheeka's and Ember's and Llana's plains.

Time didn't truly have an occupation; E-Bone would say that. She chortled. Packs of those fluffy ones—well, the pack, the singular, only, one single pack—held not quite so many souls. Those quadrupedal weirdos showed at astronomically random moments, tossed into whenever, and there by far did not stand many. Plus, sometimes... rarely... they would disperse.

So she easily remembered those of her lovely fluffy ones. A cough—E-Bone.

Where in the universe was her mother?—how should she know? All she could pertain was that she was not coming back. Least, Chieftain said so. Stella's purple eyes widened for a moment as she wondered: Why was her father's name Chieftain, anyways? That's kind of an odd word to spew on a creature, be like _thou shalt be Chieftain because thine will be chief _or something. Seriously: why Chieftain.

Stella shook herself. She could think about all the turd she wanted to in that bubble, but that was more than slightly tipping off a random scale. Didn't matter; Chieftain had the name Chieftain. Nothing else.

And Stella: her name. Stella.

Whatever.

Whence that putrid mixture of regeneration and rebirth of foul memories ended its awful return, she'd shaken herself flat-out dry from conglomerated collections of wet, stellar bodies and turned her white-padded paws outward from the stars embedded into the bolt of sky overhead. She'd run past until a limpid craft of yellow, filtered light began twirling across her body and her path developed fine and silky smooth. The odd sunlight dappled and outlined her baffled, white-muzzled expression. There must have been sparkles in her eyes; There would have mentioned them was his brown body cuddled beside her.

He's not round, though—he's not round. Stella didn't know where that dirt-colored boy dispersed off to—it'd been some time since she'd seen him anyway, and she'd rather not after her final incursion with ol' Gravity before she... left. And he, like her mother, wouldn't be coming back either, she was sure.

On that strange, glimmering hallway with the yellow light strung as if the Sweethot had eked out of Llana and contorted halls for Stella to clamber and escape her friends and family and loves from, she'd stayed and wandered. Different paths of starlit yellow with the stars of the universe trailing all about, a black midst snugly waiting in every-which-where. White pinpricks hallowed the grounds, made them feel safer; Stella had an epiphany that small children of her fluffy-one tribe would find these dots of light a comfort that proves not even space is full of darkness.

Only some creatures are born with darkness.

Others born in light.

Stella only knew of Llana and Tim fulfilling those roles—and perchance a legend or so—but they pidgeyholed out. Categories wouldn't structure those bumbling weirdos. Course, Llana did happen to be her bumbling weirdo: she loved that girl.

Ultimately the white-furred soul was surprised in how long it took her father to feel her heat waves, scent that his daughter—his beloved daughter that had gotten.. something terrible... and ran off which most likely meant she was dead anyways—had actually, honestly, absolutely returned, and come find her. He probably wanted to give her space. The accumulation of time—E-Bone despised that word, but Llana's Truught buddies used it too much, and so had Gerald; the word drilled in her mind all too easily—she had spent on that planetary abyss with the swanky elder snivy until his death and Llana, sweet little Llana, as well, rounded to a matter of moments in the life span of a fluffy one.

That is to say, without the oddities, Stella fit the role immortal perfectly, and her father would will to give her space until he jumped in. Of course this still didn't allot to much time for her—thought she felt in her heart Llana had begun a healthy recovery from that Glacial Palace crap hole, the entire reason Stella had died and come back home—but she was tired, and she had begun to speak.

The conversation rattled steadily. Their conversation.

_Fump, fump, fump  
_"A-ah... I hate this so much.  
"I hate this. I hate this.  
"Hate... hate... A-hh...  
"Where are th-  
_Fump, fump, fump  
_"You took longer than I predicted, Father."  
"Why, Stella, you've grown.  
"Quite a bit, I see.  
"We've missed you so."  
"That cannot be true. Not after..."  
"Aye, it can. And it is. Just because you've committed a deed entities find disastrous does mean naught when compared to entities like us. And the daughter of the chieftain is destined to be missed. There's not a soul here who knows not of your name."  
"There—n-no, you're right.  
"There's not a soul, I suppose."  
"You suppose..? Well, as your father and ruler, however lax that latter niche may stand with our kind, I assure you without such a fragile word that they do. Stella, they know you.  
"Yes, your friends missed you as well.  
"Yes, he did as well—yes, I'm sure. Quite indubitably, if I may."  
"You may."  
"I thought, I suppose, twas cute how your little friends down there caused that."  
"Y-yes, Father..."  
"Yes, dear. But I'm afraid we do not have much time until... your friend realizes something."

She stopped then, didn't listen to the last part. She already knew, dumb Father, she already knew. Lady Munaah eroded to desperation as Tim did to his own fate. Blind, numb, dumb; she hadn't quite knotted that thought, that notion, that epiphany in until stellar accusation lead to bloodshed and death. That Munaah child, at her time, allotted much more a fateful mishap than Tim did: her trouble more bountiful, she a fountain of sludge, his own not even started as of yet. And then it did as she left; it overflowed, burbled out, tried to sweep her poor snivy dear, take her in as well. Thank legends she'd been drawn to the Sweethot who somehow managed her odd little plight, like a bird about to take flight, but its wing is broken.

Sad as it was.

Obviously, most indubitably, painfully noticeably, the fluffy one in her white coat and elegantly-curved paws—like her mother's, she was told, like Middenin's—Stella needed to move. The gem about her neck wrapped so tightly in fluff white as wool until sparks of need, need to do something for Llana, burst through and she toyed with the purple crescent at her throat in some foreign need to simply do. Do something. Help her.

Stella's paws, painfully, had been tied up in her own business. The lurking stares from her dear pack—of course everyone remembered her, everyone remembered everyone, and if they didn't remember, they could ask Dremalynn to find and unearth those legit memories—screamed more than suggested she didn't run off and bumble around for the reptile she spoke of. Snivy, it was—not just reptile. Snivy. They didn't really understand the whole pokemon concept.

And so, even with the pleas Llana may have cried rolled up tight with the dust in her head, Stella had to sit and stay like a crappy good girl. Not that it meant she had to stay and do nothing. The fluffy ones weren't up to much trouble as it was. Rather easy—she'd found it, calling up mindless creatures, begging and eventually bagging her father in on it: a palace. Fluffy. Made of clouds. Like a monument, but one whose sole purpose did not include lasting. That yellow string of pathways she had found only prior soon revealed to be Sweethot particles, floating, waiting, waiting to break down and open up again. She supposed they had been leading her away.

Further, deeper out of fluffy-one grounds—simple space, simple stars, simple orbit—like the tail of a comet lead striking into those clouds: massive, white, tinged with just the right pastel colors, swirled with enough fluff to use as a substance but not too much so it was heavy and able to easily fall and crack or whatever clouds did if a soul dropped them on the head—do clouds have heads? No matter. She found it a strike toward impossible to drop the puffy white things.

Their main attraction was the yellow lines, the hues, seeping in like shadows, but yellow shadows: trustworthy shadows. Good shadows. Llana would have approved of those shadows; Stella could practically taste the sour curdle of her newfangled fear to them.

Stella, whistling furiously, with waggles of her white-padded paws, managed to wrangle together her pack of creatures that her group was, that fate had hereby strung. Somehow they seemed to give an ear and listen well—avidly—to Stella's royal-tongued explanations and even bobble their heads in a form of support. Plus they were bored; bored fluffy ones didn't mix well. Sometimes these things happened, and nothing lulled their attentions that well, caught it.

Bored fluffy ones played rather mean pranks. With a cough that roughly prattled her throat, Stella soon found it simple to play with her friends' attention spans and keep them hopping up and wanting to work on this palace. Opposite of Glacial—she couldn't think of a fine-tuned name as of then, but something would spike.

With their attentions gathered and cause listed, set upon set of trimmed, celestial paws scooped for clouds, most of those pairs gathering bundles and sculpting. First a ground, foundation for the start to model upon, then doors, then spirals, towers, chambers, corridors, stairs. Windows sewn and sprinkled by mist, plays on color, to alight rainbows and emit light in every available space to pocket. Walls also held barriers and on stuck more clouds, forming warm, welcoming enclosed spaces. She and a few others stored a few alcoves and balconies that didn't require rainbow windows to face the outdoors of those stellar cloud puffs.

Those who didn't immediately set out for labor scooped a pawful of puff and mushed it in someone's face; a cloudball fight would ensue. These occurred regularly enough, but the white silhouette with fluffy bits of white sticking out in deranged places, cloud particles snuffing out some areas, oversaw how these could give the fluffy ones more a chance to recover if boredom threatened to rear its ugly butt head.

Stella... was satisfied. The labor took long expanses, but with helpfully annoying E-Bone popping up all over, she understood just how slowly the world moved for them at that time and how fluffy ones don't need to scrape up half a day for rest and they would finish in time for Llana to see it—whenever she cracks. The fluffy one knew her dear little grass reptile all too well, and saw through the chips of scale just how nervous, terrified, the snivy's heart beat underneath her crystal shard of a necklace. Stella was growing satisfied; Llana was growing terrified. She would snap; something was to cause her need of freedom, to bolt. There were small false-alarms, all somehow safely caught by the snivy herself.

At first, the obvious plan was to scoop up the poor dear herself, Stella deliberated, but the ongoing tasks above her gave her less and less free time to glimpse out and roam for the girl. She had to do this—had to make this for dear Llana. And she stumbled along a lost—frightened, missing, seemed to be missing the route to heaven—soul. Wide, dark eyes: not necessarily from fear. Just wide and dark and huge. Those pupils, if hungry enough, looked ready to bite off the tip of Stella's snow-white nose. She recognized the furry, yellow-flapped thing: Elijah. Name.

Llana had a thing for him. That too swelled in her mind. Thus she crowned the lost, dead emolga king of the Llana search party—also the single member of it—and it hardened, crusted up to him for his job. He checked under the folds of clouds regularly for Llana's auburn-eyed sight. Stella bestowed a section of blank cloud plain for wisps to grow and manifest for moments of characters, if thought of, for the boy to play around with. He liked that. When the castle truly reigned tall and Stella's new task became dodging off from There and Herb fearfully—shame a welt in her throat, tears in her eyes—the emolga kid would sit up at the top of the very top where everyone carved in their pictures including him and watch out for her, summon her wisp, summon Tim's because she had no idea why, and just do that: watch.

Kind of freaked her out. Then her problems bloomed to an overwhelming flower-petal-horde of abundance tossing scents of fear in her face when she stumbled somewhere along the line, slipped, and quickly found a brown paw laced over hers.

"There.  
You're... here. Why are you—why are you..."  
"Stell... Herb told me enough to find ye.  
"She said she managed to find you in a dream locked with that Llana doll. She found you and was happy and I knew you must be here, aye—please don't hide from me.  
"I love ye, Stella. Even now. Always."  
"Your brother did something to me, There."

The unnerving part: he didn't flinch back or react in any way to that hinted wording. A bile, slick, coating her in a flood of tears, rose and she didn't know what to say because then There leaned down beside her and casually used her body to support his, like he always had. And their tails linked, and his awkward pointed tooth gleamed at her in a swanky grin.

"It's surprisingly easy to love a girl who had something so foul done to her. Twasn't your choice. Twas force. Gravity... he was force. Twas his power. Tis his power, even to where he's been lost to now."

"You're making my face snotty, There."

A great broomstick paw lifted and pawed at her snout, scrubbing off slimy layers of green ooze. "Whoops. Sorry."

"You scallywag."

"Mm. Guess I might just deserve it a little." A bark of rough-edged, warmly-laced laughter flowed from There's maw.

"Nah, I prolly deserve it a little more."

"Nah,_ I _prolly deserve it a little more." One of those glassy yellow orbs twinkled.

In the end, Stella didn't know what else to do but sit next to that cloud-brained idiot, so she did. She did until time sped up and flew, and E-Bone scuttled around on his pale limbs with his black-outlined stomach and black-green back all the way up to that weird cap of a head and he howled about how long they'd been sitting, and Stella didn't say much, and There didn't say much, just a snicker. Eventually they spoke softly of little things, like Herb, like Chieftain, like how much Stella's paws actually looked like Middenin's, like a lot of creatures and things. There was peace before Llana would finally show, and Stella could welcome her dear little snivy Llana once more.

_Llana_

Moments skip like stones and speed on, propel. Laughter charms hearts, charms souls, blooms smiles like roses unto faces, and each grin may have its own special thorns, but that's what gives each beam its own bloom. Specialty. The raucous laughter of fluffy ones—an abundance of those gentle-minded creatures—bounces along the walls that I so dearly adore. Exploring chambers, exploring the cumulonimbus gatherings outdoors, seeking windows, crafting wisps of a little blue oshawott, watching her tither and galumph about.

I miss them some, but this Kindred Palace—it charms me. I've told this to Stella, how this must be opposite of the Glacial one and, in slight giggles, how she didn't want me trespassing the Great Glacier but cared not for her bumbling idiot clouds circling about, and she simply agreed, and her face went bright and merry. She enjoys me here as well.

Leaving them...

Shocking, cold hands of reality grapple for me, feel me, require my warmth and struggling. I don't want to bubble back down and let its cooling touch freeze me over.

My heart wants to belong here—even though this is temporary, it can't, it's impossible.

Those beginning touches, kisses, shared with my special Elijah who I cling to as often as I possibly can—proving to a multifarious of occasions, which I readily acquiesce—have grown to accept more. I... don't want to lose him. I don't want to leave him. The castle's cloudy composure feels strong enough, and as irrationally impossible as this structure will hold—changes will take place—I want to stay here. Stay with these moments.

They summon memoirs, strong, tear-jerking moments of life that I'd rather hang onto: when my mother and father still lived, the elegant green servine and jolly whorls of a simisear, Dew and James; when it was my Gerald and my Stella, painfully overprotective to the core, until times, times passed, Gerald grew old—prior to his ditching until he could die without me seeing; when I rammed into Zoey and her wet body welcomed me and we found others to join us: when Tim seemed mild, mysterious, not so scary; when Burr and Mina both were still alive; when Bay and Elijah and Vivi could be merry and copy and paste in a time for her, when Kyo still held that vim locked in him.

Others, as well. But as others form, darkness begins to cloak, and pain sneaks like a blade in the corner of a black night and it stabs where no one is watching until the blood trickles down and one loses themselves, loses control. And it hurts.

It hurts.

The longer I have to learn and accumulate more on the pirate-esque There, the shy, flowery, Herb, the mysterious yet proud and mighty and trustworthy Chieftain, the more kisses I can give Elijah—the closer my time ticks.

Tick  
Tick  
Tick—  
I don't want you to end. But you will; you have to; your haven, your purpose, is to end, just like your counterpart, and I will have to leave and let reality swamp me, cold, harsh. The pain of Burr's and Mina's deaths will ram and stab first, leaving me bleeding alone and defenseless, vulnerable, weak, needy, then comes Tim and whatever damage he's done while I was gone, and Zoey... and the pain that must claw up and down her face.

I don't want you to end—but you will. You have to. Your haven—your purpose—is to end.

I don't want you to end, but you will, you have to, your haven, your purpose, is to end.

I don't want you to end but you will you have to your haven your purpose is to end.

To end.

I try to snuff it for now and smile off the tears. It will end, but that's not now. I have to enjoy these moments of open love while they last before I never see them again and reality is all that I have left to hug.

**Me: There was this one word I was reaaaaallly unsure whether or not I could use it. So I didn't. It's painfully obvious where it should have gone though.**

**Stella: just stop**

**There: I already want to kill him, aye, so it ain't helping**

**Me: ewe**

**Herb: please be nicer to my friends I love them**

**Stella: -slaps me across the face- SHE SAID PLEASE YOU MORON IT'S THE MAGIC WORD.**

**Me: The magic word isn't allowed in here.**

**Stella: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO -falls over, belly-up-**

**Me: I'd always planned this funky haven castle... and There forgiving and loving Stella anyways, but not in this situation. Llana wasn't going to break down and find her way here, but that's what happened. Yeay. Funny how stuff changes... x3**


	25. Release

Chapter 25: Release

Patches of white and yellow—other gentle pinks and purples lope aimlessly as well—sit in the frame of the universe staring above me. I know not of where I am, just that these clouds are far away from where my black-furred and hardhearted troubles lie. If only the slight, airy breeze could whiff them away from me. Remove him. Remove him: a chant in my head. It won't come true; I can wish.

Fists clenched beside me, angular nose pointed up in the air at the sky—the higher sky, as this is all sky far as I can tell—the waves of air seem to assure me: of what, exactly? It's a blanket of safety with no known purpose, just assurance.

Perchance this nonliving substance has connected thoughts, spun a thick sense of realization and saw that its time has come. Is coming. Close. Little things: chinks in the towers, bubbling bits of puff tumbling apart, loss of valor, of color. Enough to provide sense, that this is going away.

Nothing in my heart pleas for this; rather the opposite clangs inside. Don't do this... don't hurt this—don't take this away from me. But the question ensues: take what away?—it's already going—it never was mine. And it shall leave: a natural Mystery Dungeon demolished by the changes of life.

Life is full of changes—but some changes don't—but this change does. It will happen, and I will be left in the black-pitted nadir of reality once more, the monsoon tersely labeled life to pick me up and sweep me off my feet. I don't want Tim to show again; I don't want to see the blood drawn; I don't want pain to touch my face and whisper again that Burr and Mina are dead now.

Because Tim in fact killed them.

They will not return. Not ever. Corpses mindlessly, numbly tossed into a grave, a yellow blanket frozen from my touch cast upon them and the permafrost dug above them. Elijah died there too. He lost his life in the same barren wasteland of ice.

Stella once told me to never go there upon my own will; but after the desperation—what we thought Bittercold, darkness—had fled, it was safe; we could emit hope.

Then the true Bittercold chopped up that hope and tossed it. All for naught.

Why does he break us apart—why does he enjoy this? One of the clouds hovering above me takes on a lily-like sheen, a misty purple and the bent shape resembling the long, flowing petals. Another like the fang of a great creature beaming down upon me, his face alight like a star's. Another with the arcing accuracy of a hunter, plowing down upon its fallen-kin. Then yet another puffing like an oshawott as it skylarks in the fields of destiny.

Thundering clouds roil from behind; shards of ice stick to it: I furiously shake myself because those ones don't exist.

This bucolic landscape providing me safety won't last. I struggle with the emotions where I lay, rolling and squirming in my belly-up position. Perchance I should yell _no _or plea _why, _but I understand this case perfectly: I simply don't want it to happen.

Life is hard, sometimes: choosing betwixt one bad choice and one bad choice, which one seems less horrendous. But—right now I don't have a choice. Just time. Time that slips through my fingers and leaves me chasing nothing because it's already gone, melded, stamped into the past, carved to memory, and then nothing more but a stray memoir to occasionally stumble upon and recall those times again.

Life is hard, sometimes.

I shake myself and stand, rubbing my hands over the small of my scaled back in a feeble attempt to scrape out the pouf that smothers me. It sticks, oddly, then melts from my grip and sails into the clouds above, or below, or straight-out toward, simple and professional of a cloud.

The cumulonimbus creatures have become kind to me. In sudden recurrence, I recall the dream I'd had, where I'd screamed and rolled out of my hay bedding back... back at home. Back in Paradise. With Darkie in it. And her... her pet; as much as I will the pastel-colored bubble beside her had been not whom I'd thought it was—it was. These sorts of clouds had been floating, accumulating, prior to when the black one of shards of ice splintering inside of me with the thundering, stifling nothingness and bitter, wracking cold.

Glacial; Kindred. The palaces... collide. Is that what will happen when my own palace falls, just as... Darkie's did? Or will there be the actual, true opposite lying in wait? I recall in a white shock Tim never actually told me if the castle had been his.

Is he still at large?—am I still at risk? Could be; could be. Anxiety festers like a bruise that only blackens and burdens and blooms inside of me, filling up the space left and then taking more, tearing into whatever it can in order to stick me in on my hands and feet, consume me.

This worry should abandon me by the time I drop into reality again.

I'm fretting for my beloved friends. Please—Tim didn't kill another one. These are... strong entities... with hopes and dreams entwined with mine; just because I'm not around can't mean he's just got to chop off more heads or some vile premonition referring to such. Besides, he didn't see where I've gone. He might assume I'm waiting, just waiting, for him to make a move so that I can use it and die.

Horrid, horrid—morbid—of a thought, but it's all I can hang onto whence I must return home.

Which will be soon. Too soon. Not soon enough. The blood in my veins rustles, then breaks into a full-out sprint.

"Oh my _stars! _Llana, you look like you just saw a ghost!—though I guess you have—oh, you know what I mean! Dear, what the heck is going on in there?"

_FUMP. _

The landing of a white-furred fluffy one disturbs my thought system. Stella. I relax.

"It's... I... ah..." My slightly-royal tone shifts, cracks. "I don't... I..." A struggle to pour out the words, one that chokes me and demurs me, bemused with my pawing flail: I'm drowning inside. Bathypelagic nonsense clogs me.

"My... stars." With a wave of her body, Stella buffets me using her warmth and layers—waves—of white. Thoughts slow; time ticks to a stop; I catch my breath.

It's calm.

Even for singular instances, air has cleansed me and sifted unto me, bestowed onto me: I can breathe. My browned orbs close, I cover my face, and I whisper quietly. "I... found you again. I've missed you—I've missed you more than I could imagine. Stella... and he... you brought Elijah—and it's peaceful here, and it's glorious. And soon it will all fall apart..." Without momentum, just emotions, heartstrings plugging into my basic movements, I cling to Stella and cry into her chest. "And I don't want to lose you ag—_ain—!" _And I don't.

She and Gerald were my rock. I always relied on them for that expanse of forever until he grew old and he left to pass away where I wouldn't have to see his cold, dead corpse. Stella dispersed to deal with Lady Munaah and her tyranny. And then I was alone until I found Zoey—but here I am again. And here is Stella again.

Half of my rock.

More than nothing.

It's still something—something important to me—something I need—something I refuse to release even though I have to and what if I never see her again? I... don't want that.

Still half of my rock stands; Stella lives on forevermore. Don't... stay here... and let me go... if you love me too... You know I don't want to leave...

Stella... I don't want to lose you...

A paw drapes about her side, touches me, caresses me. "I'm here now."

_Right now, I'm safe._

"Stella!" My cry, wet, disgusting, dripping, painful, alone, needy. "I always want you here!"

_I want you always safe! _

Can the moment even matter when I'm going to lose you anyways? What do I have to hold onto if half of my rock is gone now? Stella... you mean more than you could imagine to me... My fists cling to her furry body and I weep.

"Ah..." A breath. "Llana..." A pause. It stretches, clings to me, draped unto her, til we're stuck together in the wet silence, my tears unyielding, raining and shattering and losing, losing, losing. I lost Elijah. The words echo back.

Stella... you can't... you're... you can't...

You're half of my rock; you can't leave me...

"I've never heard you speak of me so kindly... To hear now... to hear how you feel... how much you've missed me... how much you've missed Gerald and me—us—to see it flung back to me with this emotion in your soul, embedded there, from him, from me...

"Llana..."

Her muzzle traces down the side of my cheek and that little, pink tongue flickers out, lightly strokes me.

It's not much...

but it's enough.

It's enough.

"What we brought you up with, Llana... it's inside of you. He knew who you are; he always knew, one way or another. Gerald was... a good man. Will always be. And what we've shown you, you can spread to others. I'm—he's—always there, in your heart. Even if we can't be there any longer.

She flickers a little smile. I feel like a child again, like the child I had been when she first found Gerald and myself, when my parents first lost their lives. Yes, it hurts when I think of them—but it hurts more to think of Gerald and Stella, and the love we shared. They are the ones I learned from, feared for, loved, slept with when there were shadows, they were the ones I grew up with, the ones in forever living memory inside of me.

"You will always have us, Llana. Always. You can spread what we've shown you to others—you can find those other entities you've grown to and you all can show others. Show everyone. Perish what seeps in your land, the strange magics of it.

"I will be there—we—will be there." A crack of a grin. "Course we will. I will see you again. Our fates will always cross, for as long as your life reigns, which... may be as long as mine. Maybe.

"But the filthy scum—desperation—whatever words strike your fancy—in your soil needs to be set cleansed by us. You will see me again. And I look forward to that. For now, while we are both here, try to smile a little more, enjoy a little more. I'll always be there, whether in person or not, and we both will always love you. Sullen Gerald has an odd way of displaying his affection, I must admit."

In her pause, he would have crankily whacked her rump and told otherwise. He's not here, though. "In my heart—he just did it."

"Yes, Llana, mine as well."

Soft laughter that I share with her.

After all I have come through, I never quite expected this waterfall of emotion to crash down upon me, though the rhythmic sense of the waves have grown, I have adjusted, I smile: how I miss him; how I missed her. It... it is true; I will see Stella again. Gerald... he lives in my heart. That is what counts, that is where he'll always be. He's there for me, even if he's not directly here.

"Thank you, Stella," again, a whisper I use, as I'm choked with the feelings crashing down on me.

"Thank you as well," is her reply. And we sit; and I cry; and I look up; and her lilac orbs leak tiny tears as well.

_Thank you, Stella  
Thank you as well  
_I leave a final space for Gerald, for I know he has a word or so to share in this area.

We stay like such for a break of space, as if time has given up and accepts a time of its own to stop working, to give us time, like the event looming above us doesn't have to happen soon, though it's right there.

Her white-padded paw feels muffled, squished, wrapped by my back. Her other paws stand still and unwavering. Her chest has become a wet, white mess of fur. The crescent medallion winks its purple prismatic sheen. Brilliance twinkles from its violet depths, as do her eyes above that continue to shed dots of tears that leave streaks. A soft, sad smile sits in betwixt the crossing of droplet after droplet. A lone figure, torn through by emotion.

As we lose our pace, the world seems to waken, an echo, a shadow, of our embrace remains inside of me. A bolt, then inferno, of emotion, threatens to tangle me again, but I waver, and it falls limply, and I cling to Stella.

We walk. It's solemn, the silent, puffy steps of _fump, fump, fump _that accompany her motions. The mistress of the clouds, huge and galumphing in the skies above, emits her sunny glow peacefully, blooming outward in chromaticism. It seems to help with a swipe to the tears. It seems to pat my heart on the head.

"There are no shadows here, but there's that," murmurs the fluffy one beside me. She's right; the yellow cascading down is as close to what I've seen of a fledged out bit of the black fear I'd keep spiraling into ever since I found myself in Elijah's arms and thus here. The Kindred Palace will serve itself well whence it collapses.

Upon meeting the purple door entrance to the palace in its late effulgence—cracks and beginnings of splinters, loss of valor, the same the same—we run into those others as well. Her friends. Herb. There. Chieftain. Further out: Elijah. He waves softly, ignores the tears on my face, comes closer to me, embraces. Stella doesn't move from my side. Her cloud of a tail whisks near and wraps about me, eventually tying the emolga in with me too, his white face and chest pushed against mine. Awkward, at first, but nice.

The fluffy ones share an exchange of muffled voices, each layering into others but also understandable at the same time. These celestial beings... I will miss seeing their faces, hearing their voices. This time Herb sticks out like the sore toe—her light, high-pitched squeak is easier to spot than Stella's royal drawl, or her father's stronger and royal and gruff laugh, or There's strong and gruff and barbaric kindness whispered in as well. She's a little different.

With a light smirk, the ghost beside me sifts into Stella's tail and lies unto it. "Mm." Shrugging, I scoot over next to his cheeky self and sit with him.

"I don't want to leave."

"I don't want you to leave."

Unlike Stella, unlike any of her fluffy friends, he doesn't remind me that it has to be, there is no other way. He states what's in his heart, what he believes right, not what has to be right. No barriers sift on the inside, but they spike on the outside.

This change will come. There is no other way. These clouds, this palace, willed to float and willed to fail by its kindred flowing within, must fall in the end.

My thoughts flicker toward Elijah, toward how joyous I am that at least I had these miniscule moments to share with him in the end. Later on, other ghosts, lost souls or not, had shown their faces and explored the realms and... experienced what I've done. They can't... truly feel, truly change, but they bobble their heads and assure this will be a bomb on the desperation soiling Truught. This—is—good.

Mina and Burr must still be finding their way. I didn't see them, in the least. I wish I had, but... they must be smiling, wherever they are: together, without the influence of Tim breathing down their necks and coating fear, rousing it. Nevermore.

As well—Gerald never showed. I never saw my uncle here. Stella... she told me what I already knew.

_He doesn't want you to see him after he's died, not unless you do too. He doesn't want you to have to see something like that. _

Kindred, in his own ways. Sometimes I stop and wonder about him more so. He's part of my rock; Stella's part of my rock: they are my foundation for who I have become.

I've missed them so. Even just sparks of thoughts, emotions, misses. I've missed them so.

It was... not as surprising to not see—or at least recognize—my parents as well.

_They love you, but they don't truly know you. Gerald and I know you. They never got to._

Strange, to recall what I've become, who I've been made, now, of all moments, all times. All that I've gone through, leading up to here... and to when I leave... and I find Paradise once more.

A spark returns in my heart. I will see them again. I will be okay—a flash of Espa's lilac face, when I told her, when the unmasking occurred, and Tim was revealed. Where... is she now? Where are the others that I could not bear to lose—and when I did..? Perchance Tim's only left marks on Mina and Burr; perchance the others are okay.

I will find out soon.

The palace makes no sound, makes no sudden movements, but it swoons slightly, rumbles softly, proves that something is about to happen—something big, in fact. With a painful traipse, a limp, as if wounded, Elijah's hands find theirs around me and his face leaned into mine and he leaves quickly, turns around because it's too much not to. A wave; a smile; gone.

Stella's fluffy friends take a slurred, slow stroll over the bright gaping past of light liquid, and they stop in a massive, fluffy horde just steps off. Rumbling ensues, ensures. It's quiet, fluffy, but it shivers and shakes me and takes me by the hand and spins me and Stella's paw stops the spinning for a relieving moment.

"I—will—see you." A purple-flecked wink. Her tail retreats, and Stella joins her fluffy mob awaiting her arrival.

_I  
will  
see  
you_

Assurance. I smile slightly to myself as the rumblings jitter me one way, then the other, backward, forward, up, down. My head spins; I slide to the cloudy grounds wrapping about the palace and sit and wait, as the world around me slides in and out of visibility.

All I can tell do exist are the yellowed highlights in the puffy clouds. Yellow permeates my vision easily, unlike the rest of what I grope for. And as I watch, the clouds _THUNK _and slide upward, first in a slow, easy spiral, then another _THUNK... THUNK—THUNK _and cumulonimbus clusters the color of dappled sunlight fade upward and out of sight. Acceleration accumulates; whirring zips past me; air whooshes and bellows and loses itself quickly. I sit. And I stay.

Ruby droplets of the sky shine to view, as if torn from my sight then violently stuck in again. The sky exists once more; I'm held in suspense of the free-fall coming. The ground, dizzying, sweeps and splits below. Where the palace goes splat and I... I... go back home.

Home: the word lodges in my throat; it hurts; I swallow. Home.

Blue, roaring like a tide, returns as well; violet slips between, nigh unseen until it coalesces, covers, consumes. Bright, light pinks splatter. A leafy green chases it, coats edges, tacks off bits of other colors.

Orange, brown.

Yellow. The yellow beckons to me, welcomes me. I like the yellow. Tints of white dart past and fleck. The black doesn't show until the end, where it flecks into shadows and I try to pretend it doesn't actually exist, isn't actually there. It works... slightly. Somewhat.

My head rushes; colors speed until I can hear them; the sounds in my throat push through and explode in my chest; _kapow kazam kaput kazut splatter; _I spiral out of control. It hurts to take in breaths, to move, to whisper, to blink, to think, I struggle.

_BLLOOOOOWWWRRRRNNGGGGGGGHHHHTHHHHHHHFFHHHhhhhhhh... ..hhhh.._

My footing, painfully obvious, loses itself and I fall somewhere along the lines. My eyes squeezed shut. My body tucked tightly into a ball. My nose profusely squirting droplets of the ruby—blood. Things ache. Many things.

I don't want to move. To do. But I have to.

Not yet.

In this aching ball of nothing but pure Hope energy tangling within me—Sweethot, I call, and think of Stella—I lie in wait. In wait of... recovery. To find the strength. To do. To be. To open my eyes.

To open my eyes.

The troubles build from that one simple task. What... what am I supposed to do after my eyes are open? Step-by-step: but what comes after one? What's next? What else do I have to do—is it a must? Must I? I ache and I don't want to think about opening my eyes or anything after opening my eyes: so I don't. I sit there. Weak. A little cracked; a little broken; incredibly hopeful on the inside.

The word strikes another word from the deepest mush in my heart.

_In-cre-di-bly  
In-du-bi-ta-bly_

Simple. Similar. Different. Indubitably: yes. Yes. Yes.

It pours in: I miss Mary; I miss Quagsire; I miss Vivi. Bay, Umbre, Jen, Espa, F, Gurdurr, Roland. Zoey. Oh... the word cools me, fills me. Zoey. For a moment I struggle to count the names, nitpick, be sure I didn't add one of the dead characters I love so that... aren't on this earth any longer.

Then I think of Gerald. Snivy; strong, grassy green build; scaled body; puffy, white mustache lingering over his lips; older; classy; distinguished; easily annoyed; uncle; I miss you; I love you. Gerald. It... I... have I... thought of him so painfully much since he... since Stella told me he died? I may have. I may have not.

Gerald, I promise not to stop thinking of you. You or Stella or either of you. You are my rock. You are my rock. I don't want to... stop...

My heart beats faintly; I feel its tottering step moving in me, working, trying, failing—succeeding. A breath; a breath; I swallow; I'm breathing. Breathing. Supposedly I had stopped but I can't die, what's inside of me will supply me til Tim cuts it open and poisons me with his Bittercold. I am not dead. I am alive. And I cannot die. I cannot die.

I recall... when Lady Munaah lost her life, and Ember and Cheeka presumed I had to die. Thought I would be taken away, I would lose myself... never be seen again. Whatever they expected to happen did the exact opposite and I found myself breathing again.

Supposedly—if I wanted to, I could stop breathing. Nothing would happen. I would continue to live. The thought crawls up my throat. I continue breathing.

Somehow, under yellow eyelids, one amber orb the color of a healthy tree pries itself open. Blurry surroundings. Dizzy. Color like puke sprawled over everything. Warmth. Heat. Shadows—shadows—_shadows. _Its partner pries as its first did, like lovers.

My eyes are lovers.

I struggle to remove the thought from my mind.

Fingers the colors of leaves wriggle, force themselves to pop open like shells on nuts and spread evenly, coating into something soft. A little soft. My head rocks itself one way, then another. Legs bend. Squeak. Kick under me, pull. My hands push onto the earth and my head raises and I have stood. The world outlooks about me as my eyes grow used to their act of seeing once more.

Nothing out of interest strikes me: white—ice—snow—permafrost coating outdoors. Small patches of grass, or possible dirt particles. A hefty scent of ice washes over me. A sunset glitters coldly abo—

cold.

Cold.

_Cold. _

It wallops me, a punch, a covering, a sneeze, cold, everywhere, gelid coating and stealing of my coldblooded warmth and I can hardly feel anything but it is cold and I am shivering and somehow I'm not frozen to nothingness. I can't die from cold—but I can feel it. Of course I can.

The pink blanket tossed to my side, dusted with frost, diverts my attention. I pluck it, dust it off, shoot streams of warm breath in my hands, wrap the blanket about my body. The thing lying in front of me, I see, happens to be a bed of flowers with an imprint in the midst. Like a grave.

Oh.

I step back, shivering slightly, and turn until the black eyes staring at me capture my sight and the tall, shadowy figure takes me. Thick, powerful smoky arms lace about me and he hugs me closely, his head on top of mine, assuring me.

Cold, wetness leaks down my spine. "Tears..." he whispers.

I don't know what to say.

I don't know what to do.

Of course he... missed me. Somehow, I don't flinch away. The warmth in his fur, in his body, collects into my loss of body heat and regenerates. "It splattered like a cake from the sky." The palace. It's the palace. "Llana... Llana." His hands touch my spine.

"I am a monster.  
"You were all right. You all were. You saw it.  
"You all saw it.  
"I am a little crazy. I am desperate. I am lost. I am looking for some way to find a path again that will not show up.  
"I did fester the wrong emotions for you, until I saw. And I still do."

A pause.

"Tim," I squeak.

"I kill others."

"T-tim."

"They bleed. They die. I kill them they don't come back, you do the opposite, you aren't mysterious then scary then depraved then... a monster. You are mysterious then adorable then lovely then righteous then...

Quietly, "What are we?"

His eyes lead down toward me. "We... we are strange, magical mutations of sorts of... creations. Like Mystery Dungeons."

"What are we?" he echoes. The deep, dark tone has never weighed so heavily, so broken, so sad.

"We... are..."

And he looks at me, and I cut off. "We're twisted, but you're twisted in a good way. I'm not. I'm twisted another way. I'm dark. Mysterious. Bad. You're light. Palpable. Good. Much more good. And yet... I'm the one that's taken over this place. I'm the one that first took over, first shed the world with blackness... with this difference than what you've got in you."

Indubitably. He... is... correct. In some areas.

It dawns on me; I'm not only agreeing but trusting Tim, and he is hugging me and he is crying.

Tears...

"We're opposites, and I love you, and this... _magic, _in us," he whispers, a sort of malice egging him on, "this _mutation, _we are, like Mystery Dungeons, like fluffy ones, like these... _things, _that exist, create us. Your realization came late, and thus you struggle to change what I already control.

"But now I want to help you. I don't want to be me, I want to be with you. I want to... see... you smile... without the pain in your eyes... I want... to stop... killing... but create—as who I am...

"I killed Burr. I killed Mina.  
"And I set fire to Paradise.  
"And now, more than anything else, I want to stop. I want to undo what I have done.

"It hurts."

"It hurts," I echo softly, "it hurts."

But inside of me, I've already been set to flame.

**Well... that's quite the colorful ending.  
-everything crashes down on me-  
Wh-whoa... I already finished this story. In like two months... w-wow... what am... what am I... what is this... WHO IS WHAT IS... -brain combusts-  
So... I trust you enjoyed this story, and if not, at least got in a laugh or something? X3 I dunno. Tim's a funny guy.  
Don't tell him shh.  
So that's... the end... of the story Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Fates through Sky.  
HAH BUT NOT THE SERIES OF PMD. PMD2 IS DONE BUT PMD3? OH YOU HAVE SEEN NOTHING THAT IS GOING to eventually come out once I write a couple other stories I have planned before it. ewe It'll be fun.**

**Thank you! :D**


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